Traveling lends itself to thinking more about travel. I occupied my time on the plane flight to Tucson last week with the thought of the states I have not yet visited. The number is dwindling:

• Alabama
• Alaska
• Arkansas
• Hawaii
• Idaho
• Louisiana
• Minnesota*
• Mississippi
• Montana
• New Mexico
• North Dakota
• Oklahoma
• South Dakota
• Tennessee*
• Texas*

As you can see, I have a southern swath that needs to be taken care of sometime soon. Luckily the next eight months’ traveling schedule has me slated to visit Texas and Louisiana. San Antonio and New Orleans have long been on my list of places I’d like to see.

And other states on the list offer other gems. Tennessee has Nashville and Montana and Idaho have beautiful national parks. But can someone offer me an incentive to visit Mississippi or Minnesota or Oklahoma? I’m sure there are some, but none springs immediately to mind.

Now if only someone would schedule a conference I needed to attend in Hawaii…

*Airport layovers haven’t been included as official visits, since I never actually left the building. (States that I drove through but that offered no reason to get out of the car have been counted.)

I have always enjoyed Halloween as a holiday. Really it’s a hedonistic sort of celebration. It requires no reflection, no penance, no guilt. Just candy and costumes and mystery.

My first Halloween costume was a black cat (my only store-bought costume). Subsequently, I went as a clown, a fairy, a postal carrier, a hippie, a gypsy, a cowgirl, and as a sprite. The year I was a sprite was my sophomore year in college, the last year I actually went trick-or-treating. Three friends and I went out into the neighborhoods surrounding campus in the pouring rain. It was such fun — and when we returned to the dorm, we were absolutely drenched. A perfect way to conclude one’s trick-or-treating days, methinks.

But next year I’m dressing up again. I even know what I’m going to be. But I’m not telling…