Anyone live in the Charlotte area? Next week, I’ll be there attending the Authors After Dark conference. For those of you planning to attend, I hope you’ll stop me if you see wandering the halls of the Westin hotel! And for those of you who are planning on being at the booksigning on Saturday from 1-4 PM, don’t be shy about saying hello! I won’t make you buy a book just to talk to me!

Yeah, I could have flown. Might have been smarter, but my daughter is attending with me, and one of our biggest joys in life is a road trip. It’s not the destination that thrills us, it’s the chance to jabber all along the way and the opportunity for discovery. You never know what those odd, alluring highway signs advertising “America’s Only Pearl Bed” or “Quigley’s Castle” or “World’s Largest Ball of Twine”—or anything with “Flea” and “Market” in the business name—will lead you to! So what would be a one day, 12-hour drive, will take us two on either side of the conference, because we have to have our journey.

So, what kind of traveler are you? Are you like my sister, Elle James, who will drive, barely taking stops to pee, to get to her destination, or are you a dawdler/explorer like my daughter and me?