The trip really was tons of fun and it was great to get away from it all, if only for a week. It really surprised me how easy it was for me to ‘turn it off’ - - I was worried that I would stress much about work while I was gone. It’s been a very long time since I’ve been anywhere that I’m completely disconnected - electronically speaking. No local phone service (unless I was willing to pay $15.00/minute on the ships phone.. NOT!) - No cell phone coverage to speak of - No internet (except on the internet cafe that I tried to access a few times to communicate with Michael, the tech in charge of the servers in our absence)… nothing but clear skies, water, sun and the friends that came with us. It took me about… 5 minutes to accept my fate.

It was tremendous.

Our motley crew:

Dan and Tammy - - these are our very good friends. Dan and Chris have been friends forever. Dan used to fly the Apache in the 101st Airborne. 6 years ago - they were working for the same firm out in California when they decided to start their own business. Disgruntled with their current employer - - they made their decision, drew up a business plan and then they both walked down to Kinko’s one Monday morning and together they faxed in their individual resignation. A couple of years of working together in Chris’s living room in LA . . they soon acquired some major contracts and built their, now, multi-million dollar legal IT consulting firm on the edge of the Mohave Desert in California. Dan and Tammy now live in Atlanta, and of course, Chris is living here with me in Wisconsin. When I speak of going to Alabama, Atlanta or California - - these are the folks we’re spending our time with:

Tim and Libby - - these two are great! Tim is just the funniest guy you ever want to meet.. and the nicest. He will literally give you the shirt off his back - - and to prove it, all you have to do is ask him. He’ll remove his shirt and give it to you - - doesn’t matter where you are. Tim is a CPA and Libby is the Vice-President of one of the corps. that Dan and Chris work with. She is super - - she has the annoying habit of never taking a bad picture!

Dave and Debbie - Dave is Tim’s brother. The two of them could be the same person, I swear. Same goofy sense of humor - - when you put these two in the same room together, it is hilarious! We barely were able to eat dinner because we were laughing too much! Debbie is great, too - - poor girl, shortly after this picture was taken - - we all were headed downstairs to the Cigar and Cognac bar, she fell down a flight of stairs. Broke the heel of her shoe - - but worse, she sprained her ankle pretty bad and was holed up in her cabin for the next few days. They missed their excursion to St. Thomas because of it - - but the next day we pushed her around in a wheelchair so she wouldn’t get claustrophobic in her cabin!

And of course … us.