Frequently Asked Questions

I "heart" you guys, because you are (pretend to be) really interested in my travel adventures, and often you ask me questions. So I'll start a new post tradition. I'll collect your questions, and answer them on days like today where I have a case of the Mondays and no inspiration for a destination to wow you with. :)

Question: How do you recover from these trips?
Answer: I'm not very good with it. Especially for long flights that take me through several time zones. When I came back from Australia, it took me over three weeks to get my body back to normal. For shorter trips, drinking a lot of water helps. Eating well (especially the night before you fly) does a body good, and especially in airports. Try and sleep on the plane if you can (though I have difficulty with this.) If you're going on a trip where your time clock will be off - like Hawaii - try and keep your schedule the same. (Your body will do this for you when you first arrive. The longer you're there, the more you'll adjust, and the harder it will be when you return.) Get up early, and go to the gym, where you'll find all the other tourists who can't sleep.


Question: How much vacation time do you get a year?
Answer: Not enough. I'm strategic about my travel. I try to schedule it around holidays (which give me a free day to travel) and weekends. (A long weekend is often enough.) Technically, I get the standard, crappy, American 2-weeks a year. I'm thinking of moving to Europe, where they get 5 weeks a year (darn you!) I'm also a per-hour worker, so I can (and do) earn some comp time to combine with my vacation time.

Question: Who's BF?
Answer: BF stands for BoyFriend. Our one-year anniversary is Friday. We've now been on 2 trips together, and we're going on our third next week. He's the best.

Hope this provides some insight into the not-as-exciting-as-it-looks life of Carmen.