20 Funny Things to Bring on a Deserted Island

The classic desert island question asks what three things you’d bring if stranded alone. The sensible answer involves water purification, fire-starting tools, and emergency rations. This list ignores that entirely. These 20 items are for the person who would show up on a deserted island with excellent snacks, entertainment for one, and an unwillingness to compromise on certain comforts despite the whole “no electricity or society” situation.

Practical Items Taken to Absurd Extremes

1. A 10,000-piece jigsaw puzzle. Nothing says “I will survive this” like spending months completing a jigsaw of a busy European Christmas market while stranded on a tropical island. Side benefit: excellent shelter material if you glue the pieces together and shape it into a roof.

2. A French press and 200 pounds of coffee. You may not have food. You may not have fresh water. But you will not start your day without a properly brewed cup of coffee at the exact grind size you prefer. Survival is about priorities.

3. A full set of formal dishware. If you’re going to eat raw coconuts off a palm leaf, that’s a character failure. Fine china, even on a deserted island, maintains the illusion of civilization and gives you something to smash dramatically when you’ve been there long enough.

4. A weighted blanket. You’re stranded, stressed, and surrounded by existential uncertainty. You deserve the $180 anxiety blanket. It’s not going to help you signal a rescue plane, but you will have excellent naps.

Entertainment for One

5. A karaoke machine. No one can hear you. No one can judge you. For the first time in your life, your karaoke performance is genuinely world-class because you are the only audience. Bring every 80s power ballad on the device and commit.

6. A full DVD box set of a TV show you’ve never started. Nothing creates urgency like being stranded on an island with 120 episodes of a prestige drama and no electricity. You will either find a way to power the DVD player or you will simply hold the box set and imagine the plots based on the episode titles.

7. A chess set with no opponent. You’re going to improve dramatically. You’re also going to lose to yourself constantly, which will raise interesting philosophical questions about the nature of competition.

8. A drum kit. The island’s wildlife will either flee entirely or develop a sense of rhythm. Either outcome seems fine.

Comfort and Emotional Support

9. A very soft bathrobe. You cannot control whether you are rescued. You can control whether you are comfortable while you wait. A good bathrobe is a statement of values.

10. Your entire skincare routine. Fourteen steps, minimum. You will be found eventually, and when you are, you will look incredible.

11. A throw pillow collection. Sixteen decorative pillows arranged attractively on a palm frond bed signals to any passing boats that this island has been tastefully inhabited.

12. A lavender diffuser. No power source, but the ritual of placing it somewhere nice and looking at it will provide comfort. Aromatherapy is partly psychological and the psychology still works when the power is out.

Completely Impractical Choices

13. A tuxedo. When you’re rescued, you want to make an entrance. You’ve been through something. You deserve the option to step onto the rescue boat in formal attire.

14. A library of books on how to get off a deserted island. You will read all of them. None of them will help you because you chose the books over the satellite phone, but you will be extremely well-informed about your situation.

15. An inflatable pool. You’re surrounded by the ocean, but the inflatable pool is in your backyard. The ocean has fish and depth and uncertainty. The pool is controlled. You know what’s in there.

16. A meticulously curated vinyl record collection. No turntable. But you can hold each record up to the sun and remember what music sounds like. Art endures.

For the Very Specific Needs

17. A full set of board games (for one player). Monopoly against yourself ends in a philosophical crisis at hour four. Solitaire is genuinely useful. Scrabble against yourself reveals whether you’re the kind of person who cheats when no one is watching. Important self-knowledge.

18. A guest book. For the other castaways you will not be meeting. Or for very self-reflective diary entries signed “An Unknown Visitor.”

19. A Costco-sized supply of your favorite snack. Practical and impractical simultaneously. You’re going to run out. You’re going to ration it carefully. Day 90 with the last bag of Takis will be either your lowest or highest moment.

20. A notebook full of complaints you intend to raise with management.

There is no manager. There is no customer service line for this. But recording all the ways this deserted island has failed to meet your expectations — the lack of Wi-Fi, the inconsistent weather, the limited menu, the absence of other humans — gives you a sense of agency and purpose that is, in its own way, the most human response to an impossible situation. You were put here without consent. You will leave a review.