I hope that for day-to-day issues the common mobile phone becomes advanced enough to work even in today's non-celled areas or at sea - maybe via satellites. I also suspect that they will become something more like the PBLs in their ability to direct help to the user's location.

I hope science can identify a fabric/material that can provide the results we'd hoped GoreTex would provide - tough, waterproof, yet completely breathable - for weather protection. This would also do wonders for winter gloves, which are a real problem for me. It would also make tents considerably lighter (no more rain flys!).

As someone else had mentioned, I do suspect we'll be surprised by the improvement of LED light technology. Hopefully battery or fuel cell technologies will also advance. I'm a big Palm PDA user, but wish its battery would last longer without charging.

Speaking of the snow, here in NE Illinois we got lots of snow. In most areas its over the top of my rubber barn boots (16" or so), though the TV says we only got 10-12". Last spring I invested in a new John Deere 3320 4WD tractor with a front end loader & rear blade, so I was "equipped" for the snow. Lots of fun!