So the time has come to put pen to paper and go after this a little more aggressively.  If this is the first you are hearing about this I'm going to travel around the world for a year.  This trip is a chance for me to go on vacation for a little while but more importantly it is a chance for me to learn about the world and about myself.  I'm going to spend the trip gawking at things I never thought I'd see, trying to communicate with people I can't understand, jumping off of places I shouldn't, and doing my damnedest to try every kind of food I can find.  Most importantly, I'm going to teach myself to write a little more articulately and with a little more panache, I'm going to try and tear down the misconceptions I have built over the last 25 years, and I'm going to pay attention to everything around me in the hope that I learn something about the people around me and the world we share.  This blog is my chance to document (what I can right now only hope will be) a beautiful experience and a tool for helping me stay in touch with the people I care about and keep myself honest with respect to my plans.

Just a few important notes.  I'm planning on leaving at the end of November (2016) so the next series of posts will be about me getting ready to go as well as information about my methodology.