So I haven't been blogging much of late, because I've been working LIKE A DOG and my kids were home a lot before the start of school and blahde blahde blah.

Anyway, I went to Barcelona for a few days.

It was fanTAStic.

I stayed in a beautiful apartment in the gotic quarter.

I ate an astonishing amount of meat. I drank good wine. I laughed a lot. I slept like the dead. I walked down beautiful streets sharing a banana kiwi smoothie with a friend like a big dork. I saw beautiful art. I had a "caliente helado."

And I had to think before I spoke, before I turned a corner, before I paid a check. I got lost and made mistakes. That's to me one of the scariest and best things about travel -- the mindfulness it imposes. I'm not exactly a going-through-the-motions personality, but I like my routines as much as the next gal. When you're a new place, you have to use different parts of your brain, and I believe that's very good for it.

If it's easy and comfortable all the time, you miss a lot of the fun.