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.