Hello and goodbye. I'm out of here like a Barry Bonds home run into McCovey Cove. I'll be floating to the surface in about a week, so if you've landed on this page and nothing happens when you click the word "next" below, please come back then. Sorry to have missed you and all, but I'll be on a houseboat in the middle of a lake, with no computer, no modem, no email, nothing but water and sky.

I wonder what shape this place is going to be in when I get back. (No, I'm not going to stress out over that. I've been through the ringer forwards, backwards and sideways today and I don't need one more thing to sweat over.)

How much of the green in my yard will have turned to brown? It won't be as bad as last year, when I was gone a full ten days. But it won't be pretty, either. I'm a little worried about my pathetic little roses, but they always seem to come back no matter how negligently I treat them. One of these days I'm going to give them the special rose food I keep promising them. I don't think they believe me any more, but I'm sure you do.

Today was pretty much a horror show from start to finish, but at least it's over. (I think.) Actually, it seemed like a continuation of yesterday, because I was up so late last night and slept so little. Most of the day I felt as if I'd been run over. Three times. Like my Uncle Bill when my Aunt Bettie backed over him in the driveway and then kept going back and forth over him because she couldn't see him in the rear view mirror. (He survived, but I bet he wished he didn't.)

Anyway, that's how I felt.

But there's something about spending time with Tammy, David, D.J. and Dakota that makes it impossible to feel down and out. They had some things to give me to take up to the lake when I leave tomorrow, so I met them for dinner. It sounds selfish, but it was the best thing I could have done to bring my spirits up.

And I now have permission to show you Tammy's boys, who will soon be my grandnephews. I already think of them that way, and their mother is a gosh darn jewel (as an old boss of mine used to say). David found a treasure when he became part of their family, and now that treasure is part of my family, too.

What (I also wonder) will happen here while I'm away? Does anybody really want to read vacation entries (especially since all I plan to do is sleep and bob around in the water)? Will people remember to check back after a week's time? Will the whole Internet sizzle and burn to a crisp, leaving nothing behind but frayed wires?

Going away for this long is a little like slipping into another dimension. You have to hope you find the right portal, or you might come back to a parallel universe where nobody knows who you are. I'd hate to have to start over at my advanced stage in life. I'm going anyway, though. I'll just have to take my chances.