The PolyBlog

Can I have a do-over for Friday?

November 22 2025

Andrea had physio at 8:30 a.m., and I set my alarm Thursday night for one to go off at 7:30, and my “backup” to go off at 7:40 or so. Instead, I woke up at 5:00, tossed and turned until 6:30, finally fell back asleep, and then blew through both alarms somehow. Andrea came back into the bedroom at 8:05 and said, “Hey, we’re leaving in 10 minutes, right?”.

Crap. Yes, we did leave in that relative timeframe with the plan for me to wait for her while she had her appointment and then drive us both to a co-working space in our ward.

As we were leaving the physio clinic, I’m driving through a parking lot that comes to a T intersection where I have to go left. There’s a stop sign and everything. As I go to turn, I realize there’s someone coming up on the inside of the driver’s side, and I thought they were just being an a**hole, so I blew the horn and hit the brakes hard to avoid turning in front of them. She had her passenger window down and was waving at me. I’m not in the mood, still feeling half-asleep really, and not ready to engage. But wtf, someone wants to FAFO, sure, why not. Nope, she was letting me know my right front tire was flat. Oh. Oops.

Sure enough, when I pulled over, it was pretty low. Not 100% flat, not riding on rims yet, but definitely in need of serious air.

Which was a bit interesting. I replaced all my winter tires a week ago. And I don’t mean just swapping them over from summers, I mean I bought all new tires. It was a lovely service for the car. Major service. Air filters. Plus tire swap. Annnnd, they recommended new tires as they were pretty low, which back in the Spring they said might get another season, but they wanted to flag for me anyway. Screw it, put new ones on. I need them, was just hoping to push another season, but I know the way my brain works. If I had a problem, and somebody got hurt, I would always blame myself for trying to save a few bucks until later. Oh, and my brakes were down last time and time for servicing, could wait, but blah blah blah, same deal. Did them too. A couple of other minor things that were “due”, I was just hoping to ignore until Spring. Nope, I did them all, get it done, move on. $2100 later, I had my car back.

Yet 10 days later, I now have a flat on the new tire? Hmmm…

I called CAA, that’s why I have the membership, right? A few minutes in a chatbot to get them to dispatch, but less than 30 minutes later, closer to 20, a guy showed up with a flatbed towing truck. He said he could do air only, but if I drove too far and it was a continuing problem, I could find myself stuck in traffic somewhere. Or he could put on the spare. Which I didn’t seem to have the keys for the lug nuts for (although it turned out I did, natch). But one other tire was low, too, not a problem YET, but down. And another could have used air. One was fine.

Last week, I felt like I was having trouble with that tire already. Not “flat” but “something”. I decided it was my imagination, just from switching over from summers to winters, and new winters at that. Just a rougher ride. I tested it, it wasn’t pulling when driving, all good. I don’t think I actually looked it when I was in the garage at home or out anywhere. I rarely go to the passenger side of the car; maybe it was like that the whole time.

Screw it, let’s just take the whole thing to the dealership and let them sort it out. No difference in cost for me, covered by CAA. Up on flatbed, the car went, and I had a nice conversation with the tow truck operator all the way to the dealership. In the meantime, Andrea took a cab to work, abandoning me (sob!) in my hour of need (sob!).

The guy at the dealership said immediately, “It’s not the tires. They’re ALL low.” Which was now more apparent in a brightly lit bay. You see, dear readers, I have had those rusty old winter rims for 16 years and they are plennnnnty rusty. So much so that the tires were not sealing properly on the rims. Now, you can clean them up, try to refurbish them a bit so to speak, and keep using them, but eventually they’ll still leak. I don’t have time for that sh**.

I ordered new rims, $500. I didn’t feel like grousing that they should have figured that out the week before and mentioned it when they installed. Although I probably would have ignored them, thinking it was simple upselling. But no, they were done. I know that there are aftermarket options for this, even some scrap metal $$ if you recycle them, but I don’t have time for that sh** either. I asked them to dispose of them for me, which they were happy to do. I wonder if any employee at the dealership took them home for some TLC and resale. They’re practically indestructible.

Okay, one Uber later, I was back home. My day was already in the toilets, and I didn’t have a car to get around in. So I worked from home. The system for booking spaces let me cancel my booking, but normally we post availability in another channel which didn’t like me anymore. Whatever. Moving on. The day was mostly okay, although I’m acting right now with my boss away.

Just after lunch, I had a meeting with one of the provincial partners. Just as we were about to start the meeting, Windows decided that I absolutely 100% needed to reboot immediately. Stuff was crashing, blah blah blah. Okay, reboot. It finished the reboot and hey, look, I need to reboot and install something. Immediately, again. No other options presented. Great, reboot again. Only for it to finish and force a third reboot to have everything set up special and nice and tidy, or something. I know I missed the meeting, with the partner and my boss’ boss. Who I was supposed to support in the meeting. She said, no worries.

I had hoped to have the car back by 2:00 to get J at school, but no dice, he took a cab.

A great day so far, but at least getting closer to being over.

Around 3:30, I got the call to get the car back. Yay, done in time for the weekend, they didn’t need it overnight. I took their Uber offer, got there, it looked a bit like a ghost town for techs, but there were about 8 clients waiting in various chairs. Ah end of day pickups.

But my car was indeed done, all good.

Except I suddenly realized that I didn’t have my wallet with me. I normally carry it in my bag, in an interior pocket. Nope. Not there. I remembered I had it in the morning, cuz I had to get my CAA card out of it. Then I had it getting out of the car to get into the tow truck cab. No memory of anything after that, just my phone and the loose card. So, let’s do the math for possible options:

I left it in the car although I was sure I put it in my bag (possible);
I dropped it on the ground outside the car at the pickup point (possible, but not probable);
I somehow left it in the tow truck (unknown but probably unlikely);
I had left it on a counter at the dealership in the morning, while checking in (unlikely);
I left it in the Uber, although I never had to pay for anything (unlikely);
I left it at home on the shelf by the front door (possible);
I had taken it out of my bag when doing some online financial stuff, even though I didn’t need it (unlikely);
I left it at home on my desk downstairs where I had taken stuff out of my bag (phones, notebook) (my best guess); or,
I left it in the Uber on the way to the dealership (very unlikely).

Nine options that came to be in about 2s when I realized I didn’t have my wallet. Checked the car immediately, wasn’t there, but well, if it wasn’t there then, it didn’t mean it hadn’t been there before. Nevermind, don’t go there. The dealership let me do multiple taps with my phone to pay for everything, and I headed over to pick up Andrea.

In the meantime, I called Jacob and he looked at the two places in the house where it might have been.

It was on my work desk, my best guess, where I had taken stuff out of my bag to set myself up to work at home instead of the office for the day. Whew.

Everyone knows that feeling of thinking they’ve lost their purse or wallet, and it is never fun. For me, it was mostly the administrative headache of cancelling stuff if it was gone. Not the risk, just the bandwidth.

The rest of the day went fine. Not least of which was because I napped before dinner for 2+ hours. We played some board games after dinner and I even won a game (a rare occurrence). Then Andrea and I watched two episodes of The Diplomat before bed.

“All’s well that ends well”, or maybe it is just “All’s well that ends”.

But I still went to bed thinking I would have liked a do-over. Or just slept through the whole day.

Someone as crazy as me about goals

November 3 2025

My wife sent me a reel from FB of Matthew Dicks talking about his 2025 goals, and reading it made even me think it was “too much”. The same reaction I have when I look at my huge goal lists of the past. But I admire the dive technique. Let’s pick some of them apart to see if they give me inspiration or can help me progress in my own thinking. There’s a video version, but his blog post has the content in a more easily digestible format (https://matthewdicks.com/resolution-update-september-2025/). I love the fact that someone else blogs about goals in a similar fashion to me — setting them, monitoring them, and holding themself accountable publicly.

Status	Career Goals	Career To Do	Home Goals	Home To Do
Progress		8th novel Advice for Kids book Write solo show 150 letters Homework for life app 25 more videos on YouTube, TikTok Perform solo show Revise Storyworthy Academy Storyworthy courses 6 Speak Up events Pitch 3 TEDx Attend 8 Moth events Attend MothSlam Win a Moth GrandSLAM Pitch Marc Maron x 3 Newsletter x 50 Self-confidence course Anti-loneliness product	Don’t die Organize basement Clear garage	Lose 10 pounds Pushups Situps Planks Cycle Medical scans Replace backyard shed Refinish hardwood Travel to Europe Text siblings Photo children x 365 Avoid comments on bodies Play poker 6x Memorize lyrics 5x Read x 12 Digitize DVDs Memorize poems Monitor x 12
Stalled		Golf memoir 3 picture books Childhood memoir 3 Op-ed pieces 4 letters to father 6 letters to authors Pitch show to 6 theatres 24 Eps of podcast Standup x 6 Pitch American Life x 3		Eat new vegetables Golf handicap Get together with siblings Photo with Elysha x 52 Playhouse reunion Surprises x 12 Time with Bengi 6x Practice flute 4x / week Dinner parties x 3 Time’s list of children’s books Wedding footage

If you’re following along at home, my analysis isn’t about his goals or level of progress. It is more about insights into another dataset to see if I see any challenges. He includes both personal / life goals and professional / career goals in the overall list, some with progress and some without. Yet I find it interesting that many of the ones he made progress on seem more like sub-goals or metrics to me, not full goals.

For example, he says his goal is pushups+situps+planks+cycling, along with weight loss, and to eat 3 vegetables he’s never tried. While most people would treat weight loss as perhaps a goal, all of those to me seem more like “functional health and fitness metrics”. Maybe even put that under “don’t die!”. If you took the pushups as one of them, would it be “bad” or lack of progress if instead of doing pushups 4x in a week and situps 4x in a week, you accidentally did pushups 5x and only managed situps 3x? Different parts of the body, sure, but they are complementary activities not competitors, other than for time.

Maybe it’s clearer when it comes to writing. His intention was to write 1 novel, 3 kids books, and 3 non-fiction titles, as well as a new solo show. And 24 episodes of a podcast. These activities are NOT complementary — spending time on one is at the expense of the others. And there is only so much gas in the tank. An author at Bouchercon talked about how they are writing 4 different series currently, and as they schedule time for one, it comes at the expense of readers who want one from the other three series. I have had similar concerns about the different projects that I want to do…even with yesterday’s post about a new Quest of the Quill 2025 (trademark pending, hehehe), I designed it around any type of writing counts, not one specific form. Obviously, this author’s goal was to produce more written content, and I think that might be a better goal, with each of the 32 other products adding up to a single wordcount metric. And yet, with some of them down, maybe there’s a complementary metric for how many combined minutes the videos are + the solo show + courses + speak up/moth/pitches.

I also feel like some of the items that he did are more “to do” items as you only do them once. Like replacing the shed, in comparison with a more general concept like organizing the basement or clearing out the garage, both of which have sub-elements that are likely vague.

When it comes to family, it does seem like there’s some sort of overall engagement goal. Writing to his father. Texting his siblings. Getting together with his siblings. Photos with his kids and wife, even digitizing old stuff or making wedding footage. He shows progress on some, and not others, but some of the others are tradeoffs…similar to the gas analogy above, you only have so much social battery energy too, and it takes more to “increase” than to “maintain”. I found that when I disaggregated things as much, I felt like I was “not progressing” when in fact, doing ANY combo of the items counts as progress towards an overall “engagement” goal. You can’t improve all things at the same time.

There is one goal I find fascinating. He wants to win a Moth GrandSLAM. For most of his goals, particularly writing, he talks about “pitching” rather than “placing” articles, op-eds, etc. Because he can’t control the outcome, he can only provide the input and hope. For others, he’s focused on the “how” or what he can control, like texting or travelling. But this one, he wants to “win”. Having seen the Toronto Blue Jays just lose to the LA Dodgers after going the whole season and post-season, all the way past the 9th inning of game 7, and in the end, all the winners or losers can do is play their best to give themselves the best chance at winning. They can’t control the outcome, however much the sports rhetoric is after the fact, claiming that they “set a goal”, never lost sight of it, and landed it in the end. Yet a puff of air or an extra bounce, and the game goes the other way. So why isn’t the goal written as “get to a GrandSlam?” You might want to win an Oscar, so you take roles that lend themselves to Oscar consideration, and do your best, but after that, it’s beyond your control.

Did I get anything out of reading someone else’s goals?

I’ll check out StoryWorthy and his app, that’s pretty direct. Mostly, though, it was just cool to use a dataset other than my own to try and figure out how I would structure things. Of course, that doesn’t mean he should. Our brains all work differently, and what might work for me, wouldn’t work for him. I simply enjoyed seeing his thoughts and tracking…

So I was hacked, but I don’t know how

September 25 2025

Earlier this week, I got an email saying one of my social media accounts had an unusual login, but it was nearby, and sometimes that happens normally when my one tool uses a different server, etc. or a bot runs from another setup. Not necessarily “me” accessing, but things that I authorized to access showing up on a server in another city nearby. It usually doesn’t do anything else, and often it isn’t even successful. I have a few accounts that didn’t quite have my latest passwords on them, but they were decent enough.

Tuesday, I went to a coffee shop in Nepean, and my VPN on my laptop wasn’t working. However, I also played an online game on Tuesday night that has a lot of stuff going on to run it. One or the other could have compromised my access, I suppose.

I’ve spent a lot of time tonight rebooting accounts, changing passwords, logging any other access out, and generally being paranoid AF. Of 8 things I use regularly, it compromised the four easiest. The second tier wasn’t hacked, and the third tier doesn’t look like it was even viewed. I still upgraded a ton of passwords tonight using a combination of tools and double-checking 2FA. Most are fine, and are the reason I was able to recover what I did. One remains outstanding, not that critical.

Still, quite annoying and tiring. My protections around the castle engaged when the Trojan Horse was opened, and mostly worked as intended. I’d like to write in more detail, but that would be incredibly stupid.

The bigger question is the vector of attack. One of the vectors may have started before Tuesday, except I can’t think of where or how really. The wifi network would be the obvious idea, or if I had used wifi while I was in New Orleans. But the whole time I was in New Orleans, I only used my phone as a hotspot, no wifi. Hmmm…

The fun that remains is when I go to access an app on my phone or load something on another computer and it says, “NO! You shall not pass!” because I haven’t logged into it with the new passwords.

How was your night?

R.I.P. Robert Redford

September 17 2025

I rarely react when I hear that a celebrity has died. Often, it is authors that affect me more than actors or musicians. But Robert Redford was probably my mother’s favourite actor, partially (hah!) influenced by looks. And so I react a little more knowing that she would have been said to hear of his passing at 89 years. (Although she liked Paul Newman more, I think).

For me, I don’t have strong views about his role as a director… Ordinary People, The Horse Whisperer, and the Legend of Bagger Vance were all enjoyable, but didn’t move me deeply. Equally, I don’t have strong attachments to any of the movies he produced.

But his acting chops? IMDB has 82 entries as an actor for Redford, and I’ve likely seen about a quarter to a third. More in the middle than the beginning or end of his career.

Like most viewers, I probably noticed him for the first time not in his TV episodes but in the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Obviously not in 1969 at its first release, since I was only 1yo at the time, but in subsequent reruns on TV. I’ve never seen The Candidate (1972) from start to finish, only bits and pieces. My mom loved The Way We Were (1973).

But The Sting (1973) is one that I think I actually saw at the drive-in with my siblings when I was only five. I’m not kidding. I remember the bicycle scene and the song (Raindrops keep falling on my head…). I’ve probably seen it front to back about three times, and another ten times in bits and pieces on TV runs.

I found Three Days of the Condor (1975) too confused, even after seeing it when I was in my teens. And I have to confess, I found All the President’s Men (1976) way too slow. I’ve survived it once, and perhaps watched bits and pieces here and there another two-three times. Great story, way too slow of a movie.

I enjoyed The Electric Horseman (1979), although it was a bit campy. I remember finding Brubaker (1980) quite dark, although outside of the basic plot of a prison warden cleaning up a prison, I remember almost none of the movie.

But 1984 brought out The Natural, the best that ever was. That’s a direct quote from the movie about baseball player Roy Hobbs, where all he wants is to walk down a street someday and have someone say, “There goes Roy Hobbs. The best that ever was”. It may not be the best movie of all time, but I think it may arguably be the best role that Redford ever played. So subtle in places it’s staggering.

I know that many people consider Out of Africa (1985) as the best movie of his career, but I found it soporific. I have never made it through from start to finish without falling asleep.

Yet I have no credibility at all. Legal Eagles (1986) was a light version of a courtroom drama, with near RomComAction on high alert. Darryl Hannah was relatively fresh off Splash and Clan of the Cave Bear, and despite playing a kook, she just came off as a kook. Spaced out and hardly present. By contrast, Debra Winger was just coming off An Officer and a Gentleman and Terms of Endearment, and I thought she was awesome. The movie is not great, I won’t lie, but I really enjoyed the three of them together. I wanted a better editor, but well, I enjoyed it anyway.

Sneakers (1992) is really quite popular with certain age groups, and while I enjoyed it, the plot was weak with quite a few scenes straining the suspension of disbelief.

He lent his voice to narrating A River Runs Through It (1992), but it was Indecent Proposal (1993) that really caught people’s attention. If you don’t remember the premise, he played an eccentric billionaire who sees a young married couple being affectionate and it prompts him to enter their lives with an indecent proposal — if they agree to let him sleep with the wife for one night, he’ll give them $1,000,000. He’s a bit sleazy with his offer, which is not his normal pure, ethical character choice. And a large number of late night comedians made the same joke — most wives would waive the money for a chance to sleep with Redford. Yet there was a deeper storyline about the couple considering it and what even the proposal itself does to their love and marriage, regardless of their choice. I liked it, but I had three regrets … first and foremost, that they had spent too little time on Redford’s character, maybe other indecent proposals he might have made. Secondly, the pacing in the movie is off, with much need for a better editor. But lastly, I hate to say it, but Demi Moore and Woody Harrelson as the couple don’t really work for me. They don’t seem to have the right chemistry, and while Woody comes off as a relatively dumb schmuck, Demi doesn’t rise to the level of even Striptease.

When it comes to Up Close and Personal (1996), I really want to love the movie. Michelle Pfeiffer from my teenage crush days and Robert Redford in a love story, complete with a journalism / reporting storyline? What’s not to love? The plot, the dialogue, the lack of chemistry between the two of them, the camera work, the pacing. I come close to hating it, just because I had high hopes for it.

I don’t have strong views on The Horse Whisperer (1998), the Last Castle (2001), or really any of the next 13 years until he shows up in the Marvel Avengers movies. Where he has virtually nothing to do. He has gravitas enough to hold a senior position in the Marvel Universe, but it doesn’t do much more than a cameo would have done. Nor any of the acting roles until 2020.

As I said, I liked him best in the middle of his career, not the TV stuff at the start or the movies in the last 20 years.

My final rankings

If I reduce all of it to my five favourite Redford movies, I would choose:

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
The Sting (1973)
The Natural (1984)
Legal Eagles (1986)
Sneakers (1992)

And if I was to only watch one? That would be really tough. He has some really great scenes as Sundance including “I can’t swim”; The Sting is one of the best ensemble casts; and The Natural is sublime for understated acting.

I’m going to have to go with The Natural and Roy Hobbs. I don’t know that I would say Robert Redford is the best that ever was, but he’s in the running. If they are looking to bury a souvenir with him, I hope it’s a bat with a lightning bolt.

Thanks for entertaining us.

Was attending #Bouchercon2025 a success for me?

September 14 2025

When I first wrote this post, I published it here on ThePolyBlog as the obvious place where I shared anything about goals, experiences, writing, publishing. Except in recent weeks and days, I’ve refashioned PolyWogg as having more “writing” focus and thus moved most of my Bouchercon experiences over there.

For other Bouchercon posts, I moved the conference part over to PolyWogg and kept the personal side here. Similarly, for this post, if you want to read about my Professional Development or Professional and Personal Engagement, you can find it at: https://polywogg.ca/was-attending-bouchercon2025-a-success-for-me/. What is left is more about my “personal” travel experience as a testing ground for my retirement.

Personal autonomy

This last category is hard to label. Part of me thinks it is not about the conference at all, while another part says, well, its NOT NOT about the conference.

I am set to retire in 102 weeks or so. Just under 2 years. And the vast majority of my social engagement right now comes from work. At the end of the day, I am both tired and socially lazy. I am not good at maintaining friendships and I do not have an active social calendar outside of my son and wife. I’ve had lots going on in recent years, and it has hurt. Even the weak skills I had have atrophied.

So, I’m worried a bit about my retirement. Some of the things that I want to do are mostly things I’ll do “alone”. I want to write, I want to do more astronomy, I want to kayak. Yes, I can do some of those with others, but it’s not my style, and if I don’t push myself, I might have to change my name from PolyWogg to some form of hermit crab. Here I was, throwing myself into the deep end of a large group, and if socializing and making connections is the equivalent of swimming, I didn’t even tread water well enough to avoid drowning. Not a strong start.

I have also not travelled alone in a long time, yet I am considering a significant tour of North America. How will that work?

I know how I want it to work. I would like, for example, to travel, say for a day or two, get to a new location, set up for camping in the van or trailer, and then spend at least a day exploring the area. Maybe that means looking up a kayak group in the area, seeing if they are having any meetups, and emailing to say, “Hey, just in town for a day, looking to kayak for 1-2 hours, experience level x, anyone going out Tuesday morning or afternoon and willing to show me a river / lake / pond etc.?”.

Or I look at Winnipeg, see that they have the RASC (astronomy) Winnipeg Centre, tell them, “Hey, going to be in town for three days, Tu/We/Th next week. Any events / viewings going on? Any one have a place to suggest for visual viewing of blah blah blah type of objects?”.

Or I look at Edmonton, see that they have a local theatre company putting on a play that I like, and go to see it. With or without finding a theatre companion for the evening.

In short, I’m afraid that my tour degrades from an exploration of landscape, people, and even cultures (however superficial) to become just me driving too much, lonely AF, missing Andrea and Jacob as well, and cutting it short because I’m doing nothing, talking to nobody, etc. Andrea’s uncle and aunt used to travel a lot, and were into squaredancing. So when they went to a new area, they frequently found local squaredancing locations and met fellow dancers to chat with, maybe share a meal, etc.

Now, I know in part that I’m catastrophizing the experience. If I’m in a bunch of campgrounds, it’s quite common for them to have group BBQs going on or a band. And a large campfire. Do I want to do something with other people EVERY NIGHT? No, of course not. That’s not me. I’ll likely do a lot of writing. I also like the idea of having a regular routine, albeit with some jumping-off points to keep things fresh.

I’ve mentioned, for example, that we have a friend who I would put in the professional tourist category. She travels a lot and she has this thing that they try to do three things by lunch every day. So that they aren’t wasting days, they do something “big”.

Extrapolating from that, albeit at a smaller pace, I kind of like the idea of three different styles of days…Day One would be mainly a driving day. Not crazy distances, maybe 5 hours worth over the course of the day. Up, breakfasted, stowed and on the road by say 9:30. Drive until lunch or so, with at least one planned stop to look around and take pictures. Lunch could be either in the van (self-made) or at a diner; dinner would be the reverse. On a driving day, one of those meals would likely be at a restaurant where I eat in, even if I only chat with the server. No grabbing fast food and eating by myself. Human contact of some kind. The afternoon would be similar to the morning, with a few hours of driving and at least one photo stop. And I would also choose my sleeping location at least an hour before dark. Boondocking, campground, whatever. If it’s a pure driving day, it has to end at a planned time. Our trip in August to BC had a lot of day ones. And if I’m the only one in the vehicle, aka no navigator or someone to talk to, AND I’m not planning to sleep in a hotel at night, I cannot string dozens of day ones together without putting my life at risk that I’ll be tired and bored while driving.

Day Two would be the opposite end of the spectrum. It would be a down day where I don’t plan on travelling anywhere. Sure, I might have to drive to a place to do astronomy or put a kayak in the water, but I’m not trying to advance the journey, I’m making sure I stop and see what’s around. We had a couple of days in Kelowna and then again in Vancouver during our BC trip, with relatively set experiences planned in advance. Kelowna was nice, but we didn’t do enough, in retrospect. We all felt that if we had just gone home from Kelowna after 10 days in BC, we probably would have been content. Of course, Jacob liked the peak-to-peak gondola at Whistler/Blackcomb as the best experience of the trip, and we hadn’t done that yet. So there’s that.

By desire AND as a test, I explicitly gave myself an extra day and a half in New Orleans to play tourist with Day 2 style structures. No conference session to attend, nobody to meet for lunch or dinner, just me on my own, deciding what I would do. Before I left, I had these things on my “possible” list:

Wander around the French Quarter;
Go to Jackson Square and see the church;
Have a po’boy shrimp sandwich;
Eat beignets at Café du Monde;
Visit the Aquarium and take pics of penguins;
Go to the French Market;
Eat BBQ shrimp;
Go on a cruise on the river on a paddlewheel/steamboat;
Go out to the Bayou on an airboat;
Visit the WWII Memorial;
Do a ghost walk;
Do a cemetery tour;
Visit Bourbon Street;
Wander along Canal Street;
Visit the revolving restaurant;
Listen to live jazz;
Listen to live blues;

I have spent way too many travel experiences for work where I was alone and did almost nothing touristy. I went to my meetings, I went to my hotel, I ate, I slept, I flew back. I became a hermit crab. F*** that action. How the h – e – double hockey sticks can I even think about a four-month driving trip if I don’t actually DO anything besides drive? That is NOT the life I want. I want to kayak, see shows, and eat local foods. I want to experience regions, not just see the blacktops of roads.

I arrived on Monday at noon, and I didn’t really know what I wanted to do first. I needed food, and I went wandering. I headed into the French quarter, had an amazing milkshake, people-watched, went to Jackson Square, saw live music performances, ate a po-boy shrimp sandwich with more people-watching, ate Beignets, and headed back to the hotel while dragging too many snacks and drinks for the hotel room (I didn’t know there were markets closer to the hotel, sigh). I did four of my list on the first day, and got Vivian’s seal of approval as a good tourist since I didn’t even get there until noon! It was a great day, and I have to admit, I was really proud of myself that I didn’t just turtle. I didn’t feel alone, or that I was pushing myself outside my comfort zone. I just walked and had fun. I even talked to a family at Café du Monde, sitting at the table next to me. Socializing badge unlocked! (Just kidding. Mostly). I considered going on a dinner cruise, but I was a bit tired from the afternoon, and the heat was kicking my ass.

For Tuesday, I was thinking about a morning airboat ride, the Aquarium, and then either a cemetery tour, a dinner cruise, or the ghost walk. I only accomplished the Aquarium but I maxed my visit there. I even had a long conversation with the young guy running the penguin show and a future serial killer / lover of bugs in the Insectarium.

After that, I did eat lunch one day at the Creole House but had a simple breakfast option (the only interesting thing was Creole potatoes, which were breakfast potatoes with a bit of spice). Other than that, the only real exploration aspect was wandering on Canal Street.

I can claim that part of it was the heat, that was true. It was over 30 every day, humidity was 80+%, and it was very uncomfortable even at night. I didn’t really meet anyone at the conference to go out wandering with, and I’m a bit jealous of Lee Goldberg’s posts — he ate out every day all over New Orleans, it seems, with his wife, and even though he’s been there before, it was a clear exploration. I would have liked to go to Bourbon Street to see it on a Friday or Saturday night, or even the French Market, but the general advice was don’t go to either alone. I tend to ignore that advice, most of the time, but I didn’t feel very alert already, not a good combo.

As a test of my future willingness / ability to play tourist by myself, I feel I did great on Monday, okay on Tuesday, and nothing the rest of the week. I realized that it’s not a completely fair “test” though. Some of the things I wanted to do are not next to the hotel, so to speak, it takes effort to get to them and I didn’t have a vehicle nor the energy in the heatwave (the week after I left, it was down to 24 every day!). By contrast, if I want to drive around and go kayaking, in a van, I’d also have to stow everything for transport, go to the kayak location, get everything out and in the kayak, do the actual kayak thing, and then reverse the unloading process while also ensuring everything is dried off. Not as simple as walking to an Aquarium and buying a ticket to wander around an air-conditioned exhibit.

I also didn’t worry about money on the trip. It cost what it cost. Even with paying too much for a lot of food in the area, with no easy options to keep the price down, like cooking for myself or carrying a cooler for the day…while we were away, we ended up buying a foldable cooler from Canadian Tire that we used the rest of the trip which saved my butt a few times to have something cold to drink after hiking or whatever. We generally drank our water bottles full of cold water and ice, at least one other drink in the a.m., something new / bought with lunch, and another 1-2 drinks from the cooler during the day. I didn’t even have a decent water bottle for the trip to NOLA.

However, as an aside, I did manage to travel way lighter than I have ever travelled anywhere in my life. Four undershirts, four polo shirts, three pairs of pants, two pairs of sporty shorts, two t-shirts, toiletries, my laptop, two notebooks, knee braces, underwear, socks, etc. I ended up with one more shirt than I needed (I bought two), and one of the pairs of pants wasn’t needed either. But it all fit relatively well in a carry-on, plus my CPAP machine, and my simple shoulder bag/purse. If I do the van thing, I will not have a lot of room for accoutrements.

Overall, I think that means my results were decent — I surprised myself how well I did on the Monday afternoon. I didn’t even recognize myself. Maybe because I was so excited to be in the Big Easy. I try to be forgiving on my day two (literally and figuratively) because I did do the Aquarium, a huge item on my list for the city. And as I said, I maxed that visit. I saw everything there was to see and then some.

And then there are Day Three options for my big planned trip. These would be short hops. Sometimes they would be driving plus an activity, or an activity and then driving, but would not be two long driving hauls.

I feel like my personal goal would be that a Day 1 would be driving x 2 plus stops for pictures (lookouts), a Day 2 would be two activities for the day, and a Day 3 would be one driving plus one activity. I suppose there would also be “write-off” days where I’m either sick of living in a van and staying at a hotel or it’s pouring rain and I’m just sitting reading/writing/doing laundry.

NOLA did worry me about two things in particular. The first wasn’t really a proper test but I spent too much eating out, even if I didn’t have an alternative in NOLA. The second was my homesickness. I video chatted almost every day (I missed one night as my phone was dead) and although free, I wouldn’t want Andrea nor I to feel like we had to chat every night while I was on the road. Maybe texting some nights to let her know I’m still alive, but I’ve read some other people’s experiences and chatting every night or whatever can make it seem like it’s a holding pattern — this is what we do until we’re both in the same city again.

By contrast, I was surprised how important my laptop became. I wasn’t officially planning to take it, it was on my wish list if there was room. But it saved my week…I would have been absolutely a TV-watching couch potato or miserable AF if I couldn’t have written my blog each night on the day’s experience. I plan to blog while travelling, mainly to prevent myself from vegging out each night before bed.

What was the question again?

I asked myself if Bouchercon 2025 and the trip to New Orleans were a success for me.

Professional Development — an easy yes;
Personal and professional engagement — mostly a no, BUT I did learn that it isn’t a complete crapfest for my other abilities in this area; and,
Personal autonomy — the first day was an easy yes, the second day was still good, but the rest of the week was not so much.

If I am truly honest with myself, I will say that it didn’t go as well as I hoped on the professional front but still better than I expected. And to be honest, pretty much the same for the personal side, even if I couldn’t sustain it for seven days straight.

So, if I were worried that I would implode and the trip would suck, I guess it was a success. And I got to road-test some of my retirement plans.