V * A * C * A * T * I * O * N

During one of my trips down the stream of conscience highway I was thinking about vacations. What it means to really vacation. Most of the trips and time my family spend on vacation is to go to a family event. This year it was my brother's Ironman and my Dad's 75th birthday. We frequently come home exhausted and have to recover from vacation! Not to mention the overload of being in sometimes stressful family situations.

Ironically, I hit on a article today about where we Americans rank with the rest of the world regarding vacations. We Yanks have no mandated vacation. Which would explain why stress related illness and heart disease thrives here.

Since the guy I live with has worked so long for the same company he now has 20 days of vacation a year. It has taken 17 years of blood, sweat and tears to get it. The company he works for is a 24/7/365 operation. At the beginning of each year I have to wrangle him to commit to days for the whole year so the year doesn't slip away without any vacation at all. I found setting aside the days at the first of the year made sure he took the time off and gave us something to look forward to and plan.

This year it was a major deal for him to get two weeks in a row off for our trip to Idaho and Montana. The archaic company he works for prefers he not take more than one week off at a time. Now tell me...if you are traveling any distance at all even if you are flying, one week is barely time to arrive at the destination and get adjusted to the time zone for God's sakes. So you see what I'm working with here...

As usual though I digress from the point I'm trying to make. Which is, we haven't had a proper vacation in ages. A real vacation that is a get away to relax and rejuvenate a bit. So we have two weeks left for this year. We will use some of it for the holidays, but I have to sit down with TGILW and make some plans.

The question then becomes...where to go?