Airplanes

I don't think a lot of people know this about me, but airplanes are definitely make my list of top five fears. Airplanes and airports are absolute the worst -- they are where miserable people go to feel joy. I despise them.

I know that you are more likely to die in a car accident or from choking on an ice cream cone than you are to die in a plane accident, but that doesn't change anything.

First off, airports are crowded and loud -- two other things I do not like. People are always freaking out about something and it stresses me out. I'm also convinced that no matter how early I get to the airport, I will miss my plane. I could have gone to the airport today and I still would have thought I was going to miss the plane. Airport security freaks me out -- I feel like I could go through entirely naked and I would still set off the alarm. I always set off the alarm. I can also never get my shoes back on once I've made it through the line.

Next, take off/landing. Have you ever thought about how weird that is? Like you speed up and you can't see where you're going and then you aren't on the ground anymore! And then you slam into the ground in a giant tin can and you still can't see where you're going and you're just going until you aren't anymore. I'm not a fan at all.

In between taking off and landing, you are in the air. I like to stay on the ground. On Saturday, my friend gave me a big hug and lifted me off the ground and that was a lot for me. I'm sitting in a chair -- thousands of feet above where a chair should be -- and I'm going several hundred miles an hour, but it feels like I'm just sitting in a chair. How is that possible?!

If all of that isn't enough, I'm 100% convinced that if I do not walk around the plane every 15 minutes, I will get blood clots and die. One reason that upsets me is because blood clots would be a really boring way to die but another is that blood clots mean the danger of planes follows me even once I'm on the ground.

With all of this being said, planes are clearly a necessary evil and I will be getting on one and taking off tomorrow night at 9:45 pm. We are flying Swiss Air to Geneva then Zurich then Rome and after we go through customs in Italy, we need to go back through airport security and get on another plane, because we are heading to Paris.

Also, we are taking a limo to the airport tomorrow and I think that is cool.

6 cities, 4 countries, 3 weeks, 3 Jaffe women and 1 awesome adventure

That is my trip by numbers, thank you very much.

I'm going to miss my friends a lot while I'm gone. I probably should have written this before I gave them the link to my blog because now they might get the weird idea that I actually like them or something.

In all seriousness, it's hard enough to be in Massachusetts while they're all in PA, NY and NJ and now I'm literally going to be half a world away. I wish I could share this adventure with all of them, because it's going to rock and I know that blogging just won't be enough.

And ok, maybe I do like them a little.

I have completely mastered the art of not packing. Go team.

My Travel Rules

I went on a little 36 hour road trip this weekend back to my alma mater (can I say that? ...alma mater... It's weird) DeSales University to see a fiddler on a roof or something. While I was there, all of my friends were like "Thomson, what are we going to do for the three weeks while you're away?! How will we reach you?" [insert melodramatic swooning gestures as my friends worry about how empty their lives will be without me]. And I was like, it's ok! I have a blog!


Now, being the Type A person that I am, I have specific travel rules about communicating with the rest of the world while I'm on vacation. First of all, Whitney and I will not be technology-free in Europe -- we aren't that crazy -- her phone will have international calling, but my phone is going to be more useful as a paper weight than an actual form of communication for the next three weeks. Whitney is also bringing her computer and I'll have an iPod, both of which I shall use for blogging purposes...and not much else. My rules are as follows:

1. I don't check social media. Sorry Facebook, but there is a reason I left the United States and it has a little bit to do with needing a break from my 500 "friends." The same goes for Twitter and Instagram (at least, it would if I had an instagram, which I do not).
2. I don't check my email. Emails are a lot like Facebook and Twitter, except longer and more important; it's where people talk to me about grown-up things. The email rule is flexible but I did set up an auto-reply message that is all cute and diplomatic about me being away on vacation and I set it up to start a day before I leave and continue an extra day after I get back (because I'm a bad ass).
3. I will reply to messages posted on my blog when I can. I'm going to be six hours ahead of you guys, you will literally be writing to me from the past and this time-space continuum stuff is messing with my brain, so if I see a comment, I will attempt to respond (unless it's dumb, in which case, I will politely ignore it to save you some dignity).
4. I write this blog as if no one is actually reading it, because then I don't get my hopes up that people actually care and I also think it's a little bit funnier when you do it that way. Don't get offended by that! I'm going to write things that are way, WAY worse than that, so if you're going to be upset over my writing style, you should probably get out now. With that being said, studies have shown that people who read my blog are wittier, smell better, have nicer hair and are more likely to get souvenirs than non-blog readers.
5. BONUS RULE - Even though I'm Type A, rules are meant to be broken, so if you're absolutely lost without me and you must speak with me, leave me a comment that tells me to check my email. (You should probably write me an email as well, cuz just commenting like that would be weird).

I think those are all of my rules, but I also have a tendency to make this stuff up as I go along, so if I do come up with something else, I'll be writing about it.

I've spent the entire day coming up with itineraries and schedules. I'm not great with planning stuff like hotels and travel arrangements, but I know how to plan out an awesome day. Although, with that being said, I'm still not done.

My current key to planning is actually to plan in time for surprises. There is so much to see and I'm usually one to want to see it all, but I refuse to be stressed out about trying to schedule perfect moments or miss out on certain opportunities because I'm determined to see everything on my list.

I've already been told that I have "to get lost in Venice," both by a friend and by a few guide books and having looked at a few maps of Venice, I can already tell that I won't have to try to do that, but I'm taking that thought process with me to each of the places I'm visiting -- except for Rome, because I was specifically told that that was NOT a good idea.

Hemingway Tours Incorporated

Ernest Hemingway was a cool guy. He was also two big buckets of crazy, but we don't need to talk about that. The dude went everywhere. Before planning this trip, I knew about his house in Key West and the famous Hemingway cats (he had such an affinity for polydactyl cats -- cats with extra toes -- that they are now commonly referred to as "Hemingway cats" and something like 42 of these cats continue to roam his home in Key West -- which has been turned into a museum -- freely), I did not, however, truly understand the scope of his European presence.

I knew that Hemingway had spent an incredible amount of time in Paris -- one of the hubs for the Lost Generation -- and that that's where he met F. Scott Fitzgerald and numerous other writers who we all suffered through in high school or a freshmen lit. course in college but will undoubtedly come to appreciate in twenty years or something when we realize what a luxury reading books is. France was not his only haunt though -- he also spent years in Italy and Spain and all of these places heavily influenced his writing. As I am reading my guide books and trying to create itineraries that maximize my travel time in each city, I'm discovering just how many places boast about their connections to Hemingway. Whitney has already told me that we are not traveling through Europe based on famous writers and where they liked to have breakfast or where they once brushed their teeth, but I have realized that there is probably a market for big, old nerds like me.

This revelation has led me to do some serious Google searches where I have discovered that no one has taken advantage of this niche market. I figure that people take Shakespeare tours all around Europe to see the places he wrote about, so why not Hemingway tours? I could make bank just taking people around France, Italy and Spain to give them a full Hemingway experience.

But, in all seriousness, welcome to Hemingway Tours Incorporated.