Goulash Gone International

Bad news for Central America: your region of the world is going even further down the toilet next week. At that time, I will be hitting your shores with nothing but my English to Spanish dictionary, a can of mace, and an indomitable spirit. (Speaking of which, if you've been to Belize City or Roatan in Honduras, drop me an email with some cool things to do. Without proper guidance, I'll end up losing my life savings at a dog/monkey/Chupacabra battle royale.)

In any event, I'm happy I'm going on this trip. By doing so, I'll effectively double the number of countries I've visited, from 2 to 4. One of those broad, nebulous goals for my life is to go someplace new every year; I have a coworker whose husband does the same thing. He's been doing it for many years now, so long in fact there aren't many more places for him to go. Last year, he went to Libya. Earlier this year, he went to Afghanistan and Pakistan. I can only guess his destination next year will be the pits of Hell.

You've got to admire his tenacity, though. If I stuck with my plan long enough so that the most appealing option remaining was Libya, I'd start writing letters to the UN, asking them to recognize Dollywood as a sovereign country. Good Lord, anything but Libya. Luckily, I have a few years until my plan for global exploration will force me to hit up the scary places. Hopefully by then, we'll have space travel. That way, instead of getting stabbed by a Libyan, I could get shot with an oscillating lunar butt-melting machine on Jupiter. When in Rome, etc.