I've been fired from two assisted living places....one for not being able to play live because of a forgotten power cord. I DJ'd...but that wasn't good enough. The second time was over a passcode needed to get into the dining room. Nobody was there to put the passcode in so I went to the GM's office and she gave me the code. The AD was pissed saying I wasn't allowed to have the code and she resented me going over her head to get it. Sheeesh. Some battles cannot be won.
Eddie

After too many similar situations, i finally got smart and put together an emergency bag that lives under the seat of my truck, containing a spare mic, mic cord, spare power supplies for every piece of equipment i use, sax strap, and a couple standard power cords (a 50 ft extension cord lives under the other seat). And i leave a keyboard stand, mic stand, and folding bench behind the seat. Though i did have to have my wife bring my expression pedal to a (band) gig one time, so may need to add spares of that and a damper pedal too.

I do have a list to make sure everything that should be in my big bag of cables (audio, speaker, MIDI, power, etc.), pedals, mixer, etc., gets packed. My big fear would be arriving at a gig and realizing that the bag i so painstakingly packed was sitting at home on the practice room floor.

- Jimbo

When set up at home, my gear is set up the same as it would be for a gig ... so usually all I have to do is pack everything and cart it off ... of course, making sure it all gets into the truck is the tricky part ...

Ditto, Tony. Being half of a duo, I've got an extra pair of eyes to check on things. So far, so good.