My intentions were to make it a Complete Vacation. I was going to do nothing that I do in my normal routine; in fact, I figured, I should do some things directly opposite of the way I do them throughout the majority of the year. So that would mean not actively getting a newspaper to keep up with the news or follow my fantasy baseball players. It would mean not following the Mets day in and day out. It would mean ignoring my e-mail for 10 straight days and not even thinking about a diary update. And I wasn�t going to even think about my job hunt.

Technically, were I to do everything the opposite, it would also mean not showering, not shaving, not sleeping at night and not being awake during the day, but how is that a vacation? I managed to do some of the things I�d intended. I didn�t come close to updating, though I brought a journal in which to write out entries daily. I didn�t even do that; the most writing I did from July 4 through the 14th was notes and quotes in my little Kerouacian notebook I carried with me. I checked e-mail three times, but only to delete junk mail and scan any important correspondence that couldn�t wait until my return. I managed to neglect it enough that each time I checked my secondary account (the one that gets all the spam and has a filled block senders list), it was over capacity with more than 100 new messages and no longer accepting e-mails. I bought only one newspaper, in part to get smaller bills and to read about the death of the father and daughter from Naperville (the father who killed his ex-wife, took their daughter, then drove his SUV into the path of a semi on an Iowa highway). I did check up on the Mets, but that was easy enough since I flipped on SportsCenter for a little while most days.

So now I am left with the question of how to recap the vacation. It was long and varied. Not only did it start, in some respect, on July 4 when Casey and I went to my uncle�s to swim and eat (I did have to leave for one last night of work -- and double pay), but it included events in three towns of western Pennsylvania, one early stop in South Bend, three days in Chicago, then a return to South Bend. I do not want to do a standard (for me) linear day-by-day recap. I can�t really divide it up by stops, since South Bend is broken up and all the adventures in PA overlap geographically. I want to put more effort into it than listing times and dates and places and events. I want to create a story, weave in narration and reaction, description and quotation.

That, however, will take more time than I can afford right now. I still have laundry to finish. I have my car to pick up (and must figure out how to get to the mechanic). I have photos to get at the developer. I need to go to work. And my parents are on a later flight, so I have to get them at the train station (hopefully) or the airport (please, no) and send the night here, since I do not feel like going to Newark, back to Little Silver, then back to Edgewater.

So for now, I post this introduction. I suppose I�ll sit down as often as I can over the next two (it�ll probably become three) days and write it all out, then post the various parts as I complete them. It kills me, because all I really wanna do is get through it, but the Internet has so many distractions. I�ll have to apply myself.

And I�ll have to write is offline, then post it.

Laundry calls! Yet another reminder that you�ve returned home...