On Sunday night, I packed for a three-day business trip in ten minutes flat. Those are some good stats, my friends, and I didn't even forget anything crucial, like underwear or lipgloss. I've been traveling a lot this summer---mostly for work, but sometimes for fun---and I've managed to get the packing process down to a fine art. I could do it with my eyes closed. In fact, maybe next time I will. Oh, is that a challenge? Do I hear a challenge? Fine, next time I'll do it with my eyes closed and my hands tied behind my back. In seven minutes, how about that.

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On Saturday morning, I got back to San Francisco from Chile, via a brief two-hour detour in Peru, where I'd been delayed until 2:30am and had sent out a series of awkwardly desperate messages on Facebook Chat to various friends and family members I was trying to engage in conversation in the middle of the night.

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It's been a while since we got back from Barbados and I haven't even told you anything about it. It was---as you would imagine a vacation in Barbados to be, particularly one taken after two weeks of packing and moving and painting---rather fantastic.

For a start, this was our balcony:

And this was the sunset view from that balcony:

And this was the pool where we spent our days:

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I would like to preface this by saying that in the last 32 hours, I have had approximately one hour of sleep, and I think I am being generous when I round it up to one. This hour of sleep was broken up across two different airplanes anyway, so it doesn't really count. However, I am not hallucinating---though you would be forgiven for suspecting it---when I tell you I'm sitting in my room on the eighth floor of a hotel in London. I'm really here! At least I think I am.

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First of all, thank you all so much for your recipes and dinner suggestions. Wow, that sentence made me sound like Betty Draper!

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I've decided that perhaps I would be super awesome at having a baby. Not because of any increasing maternal instincts or anything, but because the first thing people always tell you about having a baby is how sleep-deprived you're going to be, and I have become rather adept at handling sleep deprivation over the years that I've traveled.

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I'm leaving for vacation on Friday night, where I will spend a week in London seeing family and friends, plus two days in Paris eating my weight in bread and cheese. You might think I'm joking about that second part, but I have spent the last ten days abstaining from both so that when I fall off the wagon in Paris---and I will inevitably fall off the wagon in Paris, I mean come on: it's Paris---the transgression will be that much sweeter. Hey, if you're going to fail, might as well fail big, right? Baguettes, I'm coming for you first!

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Ah, Valentine's Day, a time for love and romance, right? A time to book a spontaneous trip to Paris for two---to Paris in the springtime, no less!

Yes, I did just that: I booked a trip next month to Paris. The City of Love! I booked a trip to the place where romance hides in every Eiffel Tower sunset, lingers in every late-night dinner of steak frites. I booked this trip on Valentine's Day. But I didn't book it for me and Sean. Oh no, I booked it for me and my sister.

I know, kind of kills the buzz, right?

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