Continental Airlines recently lost a bag of mine filled with irreplaceable possessions. This bag was a carry-on – not a checked, a carry-on -- bag and was moved without my knowledge or permission from the overhead bin. No one has seen the bag since. This took place on my way to Rhode Island to attend the graduation ceremonies for members of the Initiative to Educate Afghan Women. The First Lady, Mrs. Bush, was scheduled to be there and so, due to the nature of the events, I had packed some good clothes and jewelry and decided to take everything in one carry-on. A flight attendant helped me place my suitcase in the overhead bin a few rows away from mine as the space above my seat was taken. After the plane was taxiing on the runway, I was informed that the Continental staff had moved my bag -- supposedly to the lower storage area of the plane. In order to find whose bag it was, the Continental staff had gone into my suitcase and from my purse they got my return ticket and my name! Yet they did not have enough sense to at least give me my purse or to see if I needed anything (such as my medication) or wanted anything (such as my jewelry) from the bag. Although they knew from my ticket that I had a connecting flight in New Jersey, they still didn't gate check my bag, which would have allowed me to retrieve it upon exiting the plane at Newark to make my connection to Providence. Instead, they told me that they had checked it all the way through to Providence and handed me a handwritten number. Unsurprisingly, the bag vanished, along with my jewelry.