There are days when I humor myself, and last Sunday was one of them. The weather was gorgeous, and I sat reading on the deck before what I call "exercise guilt" intruded (this is not to be confused with "book guilt"). I grabbed my iPod and took a brisk walk around the neighborhood trying to mimic the people who I always see from my home office window on Fridays happily strolling along. Since walking sans a purpose does not work for me unless I am on the beach, I was using this opportunity to get landscaping and porch ideas since I want to reinvent ours as they are rather dated.

We’re back! Thank you to all of the readers who wrote notes to congratulate us on our 13th anniversary. I responded to many, but not all of you, and will try to get caught up on those that I missed over the weekend. (More on why that was delayed in a few.) I shared your sentiments with the staff and we all really enjoyed reading the comments on the blog. You really made the start of our vacation time terrific with that sendoff.