As most of my friends, relatives and associates know, I am taking a leave of absence in order to travel with my wife Pat. For the first time in over 10 years, my phone does not ring 18 hours a day (I can go an entire day without recharging the phone). I no longer get 100+ e-mails daily. My conversations with friends tend to linger just a bit longer….ending phone calls is not preceded by me saying “someone is ringing in….I’ve got to go.”
We have a couple of small trips planned during the holidays but our “excursions” begin in Australia in mid-January. Pat is tour guide and social secretary and is doing a great job planning our trips. My only job is to say “yes” and carry the bags…..oops, and pay. The destination list includes Australia, New Zealand, China (again), Thailand, The Caribbean Islands, Spain, Portugal, and France for starters. As my friend, Mitch would say “the one’s I feel sorry for are the dogs!” Never fear….in most cases we have a house-sitter instead of a kennel.
One friend expects an update on what our worst meal was in each of these locations……Anthony Bourdain I am not…..Pat is very open minded and will contribute but I am not that experimental. I have several ground rules about food:
• If it has more legs than my dog, I won’t eat it…..I won’t eat Dog either, by the way. Cultures that eat spiders, insects and other nasty stuff only did so because they were on the brink of starvation. It was either eat that centipede or start gnawing on someone’s arm. No thanks….I don’t need a history lesson
• If it is still moving when brought to my table, I won’t eat it. Don’t laugh……I have seen this with seafood in Asian countries before.
• If it smells bad….forget it. Kim Chi and Hundred Year Old Eggs come to mind here. Who thought that up? Who wants to wait a hundred years for an egg? I know what that egg will be like in a lot less than a hundred years! It’ll smell like a cross between a slag heap and a dark swamp.
Other comments from our friends when we posted to the blog during our China trip were “we want more pictures.” We plan to have quite a few photos this time around.
I plan to e-mail this post to those that have expressed an interest but will only do so for the first few posts…..If you want to continue, become a friend of the blog.
By the way, my dad has an answer to the opening question…….treat each day like it was a Saturday!
Happy New Year to all……Next post is Tucson and the Pima Air Museum. We will include our travel schedule as well.
Regards,
Chris and Pat Glenn
