Planning for Vacation

I've got my middle boy off to camp, and my girl all programmed while I'm gone. At last, my thoughts can turn to my own great adventure. (My oldest boy will do the dog sitting.) Today I'm starting the laundry push. I've been doing digital packing, too. Reading books loaded onto the kindle and audio books onto the iPod and a movie onto the iPad. Digital guide books and maps. Researching software for managing photos. Checking out international and shipboard computer and phone rates.

Journal or blog? If a digital journal, what is the difference?

I guess it's the audience that makes it different. When I started this blog, I wrote for a while before I let people know about it. I've kept journals on and off since high school. I've kept separate books for separate purposes, writing in one specific one to track my weight, another one for my garden, and an intensely private one for private things. I have a green hardback book I have used as my journal for voyages. I've written in it on a cruise ship in Norway and a small sailboat in the Caribbean, in Alaska and Quebec and all over the Chesapeake. It will come with me on this trip, but I'm thinking the electronic tools for the iPad that allow me to bundle with photos could be a lot of fun. Internet access on the trip is too expensive to post from the road, so there will only be a journal, none of the interactivity I enjoy on this blog. But the electronics will permit me to eventually export it as a pdf and post it somewhere, and I think I'll probably do that. Writing for an audience makes a difference.

Having just a small audience of a few friends changes the nature of what I write here. I've always been honest, though sometimes I edit by omission. But I really enjoy knowing someone is likely to read it, and having this audience and interactivity does bring the "diet buddy" dimension to life. It brings accountability and focus. The comments help bring motivation.

So I'm planning for the trip, and I've been thinking through how to handle food and drink. This will be a somewhat active trip, so only on the travel days I'll need to focus on getting an airport walk. (Hmm, implications for the size of my carryon-can't walk the halls schlepping a heavy bag. While traveling, I'm on my own and will need to have everything together the whole time.)

On the travel days, there are likely to be prefab chicken caesar salads available, my standard goto meal on my lap. But on board the ship, there is likely always food available, and plenty of drink as well. I'm thinking of making a rule, maybe something like a points system. Ice cream, alcohol, and French fries each as a point. Then, two (or three?) a day. These are my downfall foods. There will be other desserts, of course, also costing me a point. So is three points too many? My companions drink, but luckily only beer really tempts me, and it fills me up so quickly I won't go overboard. It's too hard to stick to low carb foods- often sandwiches are what's available. but I can't be counting all the time, just those things that bring big cost. Alcohol, dessert, and French fries.

Time to advance the laundry. Back to the packing.

Any thoughts on how to handle eating and drinking on the road?

Sherbert update