For the next week it’s just me and this little lady while Michael takes a much-needed vacation to Big Sur. Being a full-time daddy ain’t an easy job and there’s no benefits package or sick leave. Thus, whenever I’m home for a good while and the opportunity arises he heads for the hills. Or, in this case, the bluffs.

I know I’ve written before about Big Sur, but I can’t help being a little jealous. My girlfriends and I go on a camping trip every year and Big Sur was a wonderful place to visit. The Kirk Creek campground, perched on the bluffs with a million-dollar ocean view, is the spot to be. We bake potatoes in the fire before piling them high with tuna, corn, baked beans, and cheese. We play Boggle with house rules (you can play in whatever language you want and a fishy word goes to a vote) and try to disguise our unwashed-ness as we go to posh wineries and sight-seeing during the day. This year we’re going to Ojai and I can’t wait.

But until then I’m an armchair traveller, which isn’t all that bad. I’ve been reading other travel blogs including Adventures in Wonderland, Travels of Mo, and The World on My Necklace, among others. I’ve been enjoying photos and updates my best friend Sara’s Grand Tour of Europe and living vicariously through my friend Allie’s teaching experience in Thailand. Sometimes I think I get so wrapped up in my own exploits that I stick my head under a rock and forget to enjoy everyone else’s. It’s nice to get a little bit of time to drink it all in and see what the rest of the world it up to. I hate to admit it, but I sometimes worry that if I spend all my time reading I will never create- that what everyone else in the world is doing will be so cool I will be so intimidated that I will never write again. Hogswallop. Everyone else is doing incredibly awesome amazing things and I’m loving it! Sometimes I’m just an idiot. After all, crawling out from under your comfy rock is what travel is all about and there is definitely more than one way to do that.

So here I lounge with Leia at my feet after enjoying an evening with Ella on the new grass that Michael coaxed out of our backyard (yippee!), writing a little something and reading a lot. I might not physically going anywhere for a while, but I guess the finer things in life really depend on where you look for them. Bon Voyage!