TRAVEL ADVISORY, PART I

I guess one reason that I became a lapsed blogger is that I became a more seasoned traveler: blogging and traveling should have been more compatible, but when my day job (!) was thrown into the mix, something had to give . . .

But since I have more travels looming on the horizon, maybe this is a good time to get caught up on some of where I've been.  And what better way to do so than via photographs.

I actually have to go back through my calendar to reconstruct those travels--the earliest being last October when my wife and I headed out to our old stompin' grounds at the University of Notre Dame for the annual gridiron showdown between ND and USC.  It was a lousy game . . . but we had great seats, in the press box--a true "room with a view."  Notre Dame lost the game, but before they managed to finalize their short end of the score I managed to make my way up one more flight of steps to the loftiest seats of the stadium--the House that Rockne Built--and snap a pic or two . . .

A month later, the view was considerably different as I accompanied my wife to a conference in St. Pete's Beach, FL.  That's my kind of conference--one where I have no responsibility except to show up for some good meals.  At one point, after I had run my morning 5k and was cooling down on the beach, I asked myself, "Is this what retirement feels like?"  If so . . . well, bring it on! 

One of the unexpected highlights of my spending time in St. Pete's was a visit to the Salvador Dali museum, where I spent a very engaging few hours. . . .  But I spent even more hours on the beach counting sand pipers, including the really big one in this photo: