T-minus 13 days and counting...

We are less than two weeks away from launch! Thirty days of living in a 31-foot POD on wheels with the family, touring the great national parks in the American West. In a moment of Clark Griswold euphoria I thought, "This will be great. We can spend time with the kids and share the discovery of a country they have never seen before they start to hate us. Good, quality time."

I have found that there are two reactions to that idea. (1.) "I was just talking to my husband about doing this! I think its great! I am so excited for you!" (2.) "My wife was just talking to me about this. Are you out of your #&@$* mind?"

Now I am thinking, "Four depart, but only one returns."

But it will be good, right? I mean good things will happen, right? I mean in between the kids (8 and 10) trying to murder each other for eating the last Pop-Tart, my wife and I trying to navigate a too-large-for-any-sane-person recreational vehicle, and the filling up of an 80-gallon tank in an RV that gets five to eight miles a gallon in the day of $4.50 gasoline—for a month!

One saving grace—the dog and hamster remain behind.

For one minute let's pretend no one needs to remember the "flush the black water first then follow that with the grey water" rule. Focus on the positive. Let us concentrate on stunning vistas; long stretches of open road in the still not-quite-tamed West of my provincial east-coast suburban imagination. Yes, let us ruminate on that. You know what else ruminates? Buffalo, moose, elk—all manner of wildlife I expect to see roaming around just feet from our camp as my wife and I embrace by the fire, gazing at an impossible number of stars in the night sky while our children recollect the day's hike over s'mores and the babbling of black water being deposited into an underground holding tank.

OK. I promise you, this will not be a Pollyanna kind of blog. Everything will not go well. Things will fall apart. We will document it. It could get ugly. It might get mean, but it will be a learning experience. And, I suspect for all my buddies, damned entertaining.

So buckle up and make sure everything is locked down, we are getting ready to do this thing. The Good, the Bad, and the RV.