If you are working on multiple computers then it can be a hassle to unify your toolset. Wouldn't it be great to have all your favorites apps with you all of the time! Well you can! Just install them on your thumb drive. Anyway, here are some things that you can do with your thumb drive:

1. Install PortableApps - This is first in the list for a reason. This application will install a menu similar to the start menu on windows but it will run directly from your thumb drive. Then you can download software and launch applications from the menu. Some of the apps you will find on their website include Firefox, GIMP, 7-Zip, OpenOffice and FileZilla. By the way everything at portable apps is 100% free.
2. Install MAME - This program is for playing those retro arcade games. In order to be legal you must own the original game before you download the ROM. Over 5800 ROMS can be found at mameromlinks.com.
3. Run Linux - Damn Small Linux, Xubuntu, Fedora Live and Puppy Linux can run directly from your thumb drive. They include a bunch of productivity applications and again they are free.
4. Use MojoPac - is a software virtualization product that turns any USB 2.0 storage device into a portable computing environment. The no-restrictions version isn't free ($29.99 for a license), but there's a free version that gives you a virtual XP desktop—and that might be just what you need.
5. Run XAMPP - XAMPP is an easy to install Apache distribution containing MySQL, PHP and Perl. To run it on a thumb drive, extract the files onto to the main directory (i.e. F:\xampplite\). Then to start XAMPP simply open the main directory, and double click xampp-control.exe
6. Install RockXP - A great tool which will allow you to recover windows passwords or keys, change keys, display system password, and more.
7. Restore Files with Restoration - Restoration is an easy to use and straight forward tool to undelete files that were removed from the recycle bin or directly deleted from within Windows
8. Download Torrents with UTorrent - Hands down the best torrent client you will ever find for Windows.
9. Store important documents with TrueCrypt - a free open-source disk encryption software that works with Windows Vista/XP, Mac OS X, and Linux
10. Store important password with Keepass - Today you need to remember many passwords. You need a password for the Windows network logon, your e-mail account, your homepage's FTP password, online passwords (like website member account), etc. etc. etc. The list is endless. Also, you should use different passwords for each account. Because if you use only one password everywhere and someone gets this password you have a problem... A serious problem. The thief would have access to your e-mail account, homepage, etc. Unimaginable.KeePass is a free open source password manager, which helps you to manage your passwords in a secure way. You can put all your passwords in one database, which is locked with one master key or a key file. So you only have to remember one single master password or select the key file to unlock the whole database.

If you don't have a thumb drive then head over to newegg. You can pick up a 8GB thumb drive for about $24.