June 12, 2006

Extra blogging... vacations...

I'm going to guest-blog over at GlennReynolds.com this week, while Glenn is off vacationing -- something you can barely tell by looking at Instapundit. I haven't put anything up yet. And why don't I ever go on vacation? I barely went on vacation last summer and didn't take a winter or summer break vacation in the last academic year. And now I'm trying to force myself to plan something!

I could go to New York City, where my son is working this summer. Of the millions of things to do there, I could see "Jersey Boys," which just won the Tonys for Best Musical and Best Actor. I blogged about my love for The Four Seasons before you were ever reading this blog. I'll go on living and keep on forgiving/Because you were my first love. (They were the first group I loved. Do you even know the song I just quoted?) You know, I was slow becoming a Beatles fan because I found it so very hard to accept that any singing group could ever rival my dear idols The Four Seasons.

Anyway, I've got some extra blogging to do, a pile of work, and I really should plan a vacation. Feel free to offer suggestions on recent topics to reprise and expand over there and tips on how to force oneself to go on vacation.

UPDATE: I see Glenn's vacation ended up in a beach house without the promised WiFi and in the path of Hurricane Alberto. See, that's another thing about vacations. You're betting that it's going to be good, but you can lose the bet, and it's an expensive one.

15 comments:

goesh said...

-no sketches please and something about squirrels would be nice

MadisonMan said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
MadisonMan said...

Are the tests graded?

Wasn't the trip to Wausautosa a vacation? You just need to redefine vacation -- gone to the coffee shop? It's a vacation!

I take many vacations every year!

Ann Althouse said...

Now, you're saying Wauwatosa. If it was Wauwatosa, I'd have had more time to work on the pile of work I have in front of me right now.

And I do think of hanging around Madison as a vacation. Not to mention hanging around on the web.

MadisonMan said...

I want to clarify that hanging around Madison in the summer is a vacation. Well, May-September is vacation time in Madison. The rest of the year is when you simply endure. But May through September is so delightful (except when it's snowing) that it more than makes up for it.

Bruce Hayden said...

One thing I hope you do this year when blogging for Glenn is to either have a thread over here for comments there, or to duplicate some of your posts there over here. I seem to remember you doing something like that on a previous InstaPundit stint.

Glen's blogging w/o comments is both a strength and a weakness. It allows him to throw out a lot of stuff, but it doesn't allow the depth that we often get here.

Of course, I am suggesting this for personal reasons - that I love commenting on your blogs, and don't want to totally lose that while you are over there.

al said...

If you define vacation as not doing work then one can have lots of little ones. I define it as getting away from my regular life for several days to a couple of weeks. Done properly it can recharge your batteries like nothing else.

We bought a cheap timeshare years ago and exchange it for very nice resorts in places we normally wouldn't go. Lots of fun. And by driving we get to see even more.

Pick a spot, pick a week, and go. Don't take anything work related. Maybe even pick hotels/motels with NO internet access.

Besides - weren't you talking about a road trip out west a few weeks ago?

Ann Althouse said...

Bruce: The MSNBC gig is quite different from Instapundit. It's just two or three posts a week. It won't change the amount of material over here, and whenever I do a post there, I'll link to it here, so it will be easy to comment.

Al: Yeah, I'm basically planning a roadtrip that will put me in San Jose on the day I'm doing the BlogHer convention. Other than that, I'm enjoying Madison and the unscheduled life too much to leave. It's really nice here this time of year. And there's nothing I like more that café hopping in Madison, driving around the area, and sleeping at home. It's very hard for me to justify the alternatives. I have to do what Brandon said: buy a ticket and lock myself into the commitment to fly.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

Do you know the way to San Jose?

Ann Althouse said...

"Do you know the way to San Jose?"

No, but I expect that damned song will run through my head constantly once I start trying to get there.

Verification word: oppsx

Probably not, at BlogHer.

Beth said...

Considering Glenn Reynold's situation, I suppose New Orleans during hurricane season is not on your list. Too bad. It's a lovely 95 degrees here today, sunny and bright.

If you go to New York, please blog about your Broadway experiences. I was disappointed that the Tony selection from Jersey Boys last night featured the later music, the disco/dance stuff. I really love the early Four Seasons more.

One note on the Tonys: as a sci fi/fantasy geek, I was pleased to see how many people presenting, nominating, and winning for their work on Broadway are also known in genre film: Star Wars was represented by Emperor Palpatine/Ian McDiarmid winning a best actor nod, X-men had presenters, performers and nominated actors (Anna Paquin/Rogue; Alan Cumming/Nightcrawler); Dracula showed up (Frank Langella); and Harry Potter dominated Richard Griffiths/Uncle Vernon and Frances da la Tour/Madame Olympe Maxime were winners; Zoe Wanamaker/Prof. Hooch, Ralph Fiennes (You Know Who), and Jim Dale, the audio books narrator, were nominated.

chuck b. said...

San Jose? San Jose, CA? Hey, that's kinda my hometown. I visit more or less frequently. I'm sorry to say there's not much there. They have a decent art museum downtown, the interesting Rosicrucian (sp?) Egyptian Museum (thought to be mostly fakes, as I understand; I thought it was cool anyway), and of course, the Winchester Mystery House. You may have seen all those things before. Poor San Jose.

chuck b. said...

If you're driving in to San Jose from the south, I suggest cooling your heels (and your wheels) here.

We have a card from this place hanging on the refrigerator and it reminded me of you when I was getting dinner. A friend and her husband went and raved and raved about how great it was to me, how they didn't want to leave, etc., etc.

I'll be slightly jealous if you go before I do.

Maxine Weiss said...

I say don't take a vacation in Summer. Just stay home and lie.... (lie/lay/lain ????) about the house, if you must.

There's too much that can go wrong in the bizarre, sunny, endless, interminable days of summer.

--The dog days of Summer when the sun drives people bonkers. It's true. Too much sun makes people and situations ....weird.

Much better to plan a big vacation in December, when the days are shorter and less time to get into trouble, and less time for things to go wrong....which something always will on vacation.

December feels much more like a vacation month, to me, than Summer.

Lazy Summer days, for me, are spent, goofing off at home, ...where it's safe.

December is my month!

Peace, Maxine

Randy said...

Ann: Depending on how you plan to get to San Jose, the little-travelled (and for good reason)Mattole Scenic Drive is well worth the detour.

If you are looking for ideas for off-the-beaten-path drives in Northern California, Oregon or Washington, let me know. Over the past decade, we have wandered as far north as Vancouver BC and south to the Mexican border in a 1929 Ford Model A. We've had a lot more fun getting to our destinations later rather than sooner by avoiding the freeways whenever possible .