About

My URL to the contrary, this isn’t a travel blog. And despite the existence of my wee daughter Margaret, it isn’t a mommy blog either. It’s just us, doing a lot of traveling and moving around and just living life as fully–and sarcastically–as possible.  We travel as often as we can, and try to get weird feathers in our cap.  Example: we have seriously considered dropping a month’s rent on a one-day helicopter tour of Ni’hau.  Where’s Ni’hau? Exactly.

This blog originated as a way to keep in touch with far-flung family and friends and evolved into a virtual diary of our comings and goings. We started in Maine (me) and Florida (Tom), met/went to school/married in the DC metro area, and moved to Hawaii in 2008.  Our next move is scheduled for January 2011, though we don’t know where yet.  As I’ve written more and more articles, I thought it might be time to get a grown-up domain and start to make this all look like I know what I’m doing.  I’ll let you know if that actually works.

Maggie is our daughter, born on April 10, 2009 in Honolulu.  Like any self-respecting island baby, she prefers nudity, ocean waves, and fingerpainting with sticky white rice.  Once I dressed her as a ninja, my cousin photoshopped a Fu Manchu on her, and thus my “Ninja Baby” social media avatar photos were born.

We’re kinda green, but not hippies; we’re kinda liberal but tend towards pragmatism. I make Maggie’s toys and baby food yet I love a cold Diet Coke and a hot sleeve of McDonald’s French fries.

Neither of us speak a foreign language despite living abroad because our auditory systems hate us.

I swear a lot and I love nothing more than a dirty joke.  It’s just something I enjoy, possibly because I’m depraved.

I go between wanting a full-time office job to wishing I could stay home and homeschool Maggie full-time.  My brain works in black and white.

Anything else you should know about us?

• I didn’t eat lasagna until I was almost old enough to vote
• We had an interfaith marriage until Tom bought his first Macbook in Oct. 2007.  Five times a day we turn toward Cupertino and bow.
• Tom and I wore red and black (him) and red and white (me) checkerboard Vans at our wedding
• We ascribe to the Chris Rock school of politics: “Republicans, Democrats…just be a fucking person.”  Labels are prohibitive.  If you want to do something, DO IT, and don’t apologize unless you hurt someone.  Enjoy yourself.  Conversely, you will ALWAYS gain more by not being a douchebag prick. You may be right, but no one will want to hear it.
• I have an unhealthy addiction to truly bad pop music.

In short: professionalism is no fun if it means you can’t say “fuck” a lot, eat your vegetables, and be nice to people in a position to upgrade your airplane seat.