Welcome to my blog titled “Five Things” where you can expect just that - five random musings or reflections from the previous week or so. In addition, at the end of the blog, I’ll keep a running itinerary of our travel plans. For a photo gallery of our life on the road, our pets, and miscellaneous things I find interesting, you can follow me on Instagram @tabithalord.

So here are this week’s five things…

1. Ray and I went to the San Diego Zoo this weekend. The last time we were there, our kids ranged in age from 2 to 13, and we realized it’s quite a different experience enjoying these sorts of outings without little ones. Despite our late start, and my worry that we’d be closing the place down in order to see it all, we made our way through every exhibit in about two-and-a-half hours and found ourselves back at the campground, floating in the pool with cocktail in hand, by 4 pm. Like most of our adventures as empty-nesters, this one was both wonderful and a little bittersweet. We remember leaving places like the zoo exhausted after a full day. Any excursion with four kids in tow required patience, planning, multiple stops for snacks, space for exploring things like rocks and water fountains and the inside of every bathroom, more patience, and really good footwear. We made good memories for sure, and those memories still make us smile. Kid-free, we ended our ‘speed zoo’ day with a glass of wine and steaks on the grill, but also no tired little ones to kiss goodnight. Bittersweet indeed.

2. I’m a geek at heart. Maybe you don’t know that about me, but it’s true. I love planetariums, science museums, natural history museums, aquariums, or basically any place where I can learn some cool new science thing. I read Scientific American and Astronomy magazine cover to cover every month. Total geekfest, I know. Anyway, recently, I was reading an article on cosmic voids. These phenomena are just what they sound like – giant blank spaces in, well, space. Here’s the thing, astronomers used to think that because of how the universe was expanding after the Big Bang, matter would be evenly dispersed. Yes, matter would clump up to form galaxies and all the ‘stuff’ contained therein, but if we looked at the overall distribution of that ‘stuff’, we’d find it relatively evenly distributed throughout space. Turns out, not so, as the discovery of cosmic voids illustrated. To me, these Star Trek sounding oddities are cool and all, but the really amazing thing is that one of the observable voids is so large, if our galaxy sat at the center of it, we would have thought we were the only galaxy in existence until around the 1950’s when large enough telescopes were invented to pick up the light from the edge of the void. This kind of info is awe-inspiring. It reminds me that these timescales and distances are almost incomprehensible. Almost. It reminds me that for a cosmic blink of an eye, we tiny humans, living on a rocky planet, orbiting a G-type star, situated in the suburbs of the Milky Way Galaxy, one of the local group of galaxies in the observable universe, made a discovery that changed our understanding of the nature of the universe itself.

3. Daisy and I both got our hair cut last week. Finding a stylist, or a dog groomer, has been one challenge of living on the road. If I find someone really terrific, chances are, it will be my only visit. Still, it feels great to have a sleek and stylish cut, as I’m sure Daisy can attest!

4. Reviews matter. I’ve been singing this song on repeat recently, but it’s true. My alter-ego Maggie Clare discussed the topic at length last week on this post: Validity, Visibility, and the Warm Fuzzies . if you’ve read any of my books, please consider leaving a review. Even a line or two with the star rating would be greatly appreciated!

5. Last week, I joined a ‘sip and sprint’ with some of my new grad school classmates. We met via Zoom, introduced ourselves and our projects, and then participated in two twenty-minute writing sprints. The idea behind a sprint is to block out any distractions and then write as much as you can in a short amount of time. With my current aggressive publishing schedule, sprints have been my go-to method for kicking out enough material, but the idea of sprints can be applied to other tasks. For example, when I need to do a deep cleaning, or sort my wardrobe, or get through a pile of non-writing type work, I’ll break things down into manageable chunks. Instead of tossing every article of clothing I own onto the bed at once, I’ll tackle just one drawer, take a break, deal with the next, etc. You get the idea. Sometimes I need the reminder that pretty much any task, any goal, any particular busy day doesn’t have to be viewed as an overwhelming endeavor. I can approach things one sprint at a time!

Our itinerary, subject to change:

January 3 - February 2: Chula Vista, CA

February 2 - 16: Palm Springs, CA

February 16 - March 1: Las Vegas, NV

March 1 - March 4: Meteor Crater, AZ

March 4 - 8: Albuquerque, NM

March 10 - 17: Austin, TX

March 18 - April 5: Dallas/Ft. Worth, TX

April 5 - 12: Fredericksburg, TX

April 12 - 19: Hot Springs, AK

April 19 - 24: Ozarks, AK

April 24 - 28: Topeka, KS

April 24 - May 12: Kansas City, MO

May 8 - 23: Chicago, IL

May 23 -28: Wisconsin Dells, WI

“Not all those who wander are lost.” - J.R.R. Tolkien