Loading up my iPhone

Through our local library, I can download audiobooks on my iPhone to enjoy while I'm gone. I have 19 books already loaded and am hoping to get a few more before we leave. Here's a screenshot of a few of them.

My phone also functions as a Kindle Reader, and I can download ebooks (that I read, as opposed to listen to). I remember when I used to leave for a trip with a pile of books...that seems so old-school now!

Getting ready...

How do you prepare to be away from home for 3 months? Well, for one thing, you write out Christmas cards in October. These are for the business, and they're ready to be given to a friend who will mail them for me in December. A benefit of having Christmas cards printed in October: Walgreens was offering a pre-season special on photo cards. I would never be organized enough to take advantage of that if we weren't leaving.

It's just 10 days away now!

G and I just spent an hour on the Port Everglades live webcam (http://portevergladeswebcam.com/) watching as three cruise ships, first the Eurodam, then the Oasis of the Seas (one of the world's biggest) and finally "our" Emerald Princess sailed from Fort Lauderdale.  In exactly 10 days, on November 8, we'll be on that ship for an amazing 90 100 days!  Somehow, watching the ship leave, knowing our turn is next, has made this dream of a winter seem that much closer.  Today is a good day, I think, to start this blog.


I've been playing with various blogs for the past few months, but have settled on this one because it seems easiest to post to from my iPhone.  Photos and narrative are very easy to post...videos have to be first uploaded to YouTube and then this blog linked to them.  Not too hard.  Video sharing sites just didn't seem to accommodate the amount of narrative I want to post, so, blogspot it is.  I really want to keep a blog for me, first (it's ALL about me, don't you know? ;-)).  I do not want to be sitting at the airport in Fort Lauderdale in February waiting to fly home and wondering where the 90 100 days went.


I also want to keep this blog for friends and family.  Last year I emailed photos, over and over again, to many people.  That is much harder than this, and, when I was done, I really had no one record of what I'd sent...just hundreds of Sent emails.   Better to do it this way, I think.


I'll post whenever I get good WiFi, which is occasionally from the ship (maybe in the middle of the night when no one else is using it), but mostly while I'm in the various ports. We get free WiFi on the ship, but it is pretty unreliable.  Luckily, most of the islands have free or cheap WiFi right by the dock.


We leave for Fort Lauderdale on Monday, November 7 (which, starting tomorrow, we can say is NEXT week!). After watching that webcam today, the excitement level in this house right now is off the charts.  We have a lot to get done this week, but, honestly, we've been working toward this for months, and we'll be ready.

Follow along...we'd love to have you "cruising" with us!