The Big Plan (or, watching caution go fluttering away)

Travel makes us happy. Owning stuff doesn't (unless it's, you know, the complete series of Buffy on DVD or a particularly schmancy miniature to paint). So it's a wonder that it took us such a long time to realise that the money we had been saving for a house deposit would really be better spent on some of those big fat expensive plane tickets to other parts of the world. I try to gauge what's worth doing in my life by flashing forward to my death bed, where I then flash back to what I've done and whether I'm glad of it. I figure I'll be much happier to have had an interesting life than to have owned a house (not mutually exclusive for everyone, of course).

And on a similar note, I can't think of anything more valuable we could give our child than a worldly perspective, an open heart and an open mind, and there's nothing that gives that more than travel.

So, Big Trip #1 is almost upon us. We've never travelled further than Bright with our little boy before, so we're starting off 'easy' - the USA: English-speaking, infrastructurey, familiar, the veritable home of mod-cons and we have family and friends there. It's only a few days away now, so watch this space.