What’s Up Hutch?  Kurtis here with an update from the road.  Mary and I are currently in Paris France and living the life.  Let me tell you there is no better experience than wandering the city streets with some friends that you just made in route to the Eiffel tower, laughing with a bottle of wine in your hand and a tune on your lips.  This is the scene two nights ago on our arrival in Paris.

But for the moment let me put this story on hold and tell you about Carlos and Andres.  Carlos and Andres are two of our new friends that we have met while on the road.  A week and a half ago Mary and I were staying in Marseilles France at a hostel.  Just after checking into our room we encountered our roommates, Carlos and Andres who were two friends from Bogota traveling around Europe for a while, however their trip had encountered a hiccup.   The day before Carlos had his passport stolen, so the two were stuck in Marseilles waiting for the embassy to print another emergency passport.  We got to talking briefly about our homes and swapping stories from the road.  Before we knew it we were fast friends.  However the next day Mary and I left Marseilles for Nice, so we had to say goodbye, but before leaving we added our two new friends as Facebook friends.

Well I do, and recently a couple of them were really pointed out to me.  When something like that happens, it does make you think about how you handle those faults. Well it did me anyway.

First of all, let me talk about them.  Yep, here we go, that’s one of my biggest faults.  I “talk too much."  I talk when I’m happy, I talk when I’m sad, I talk when I’m tired, I talk when I’m mad, I talk when I’m embarrassed or don’t know you very well, I talk too loud, I really just talk when I shouldn’t - a great deal.  I’ve been working on that – it was one of the things I wanted to change in my “life changing things”, and I think I’m listening more and talking less – it works well. There’s a great quote on Indeeda Cleaners sign that I read when I walk in the mornings that reminds me of my commitment on that and it says “a Quiet Tongue Shows a Wise Head.“ Interesting, huh?

Let's see what Bob's got for us today.

Bonjour! Mary here, safely in France and soaking up the culture shock of finally being in a country where the only things I really know how to say are hello, thank you, yes, and no. Save me!

When last we left you, we were in Salamanca, Spain which we left on Monday, enjoyed some amazing Flamenco dancing in Madrid that night and flew out on Tuesday. (Seriously, the Flamenco dancing was like the heart and soul of lovers combined into a passionate song, dance, and guitar effort – heart wrenching.) After two weeks of relaxing out, Kurtis and I are finding that it is not as easy to get back on the road as we had imagined. Our bodies are now playing catch up after a couple of weeks of less exertion. This may be proof that when you start to exercise, you should just keep it up because your body can loose that faster than you may think.