Have just returned from four weeks of travelling in the US – Florida, North Carolina, and Wisconsin – visiting family, friends, and colleagues. After a dreary winter, it was wonderful to see so much colour and green. While in Wisconsin, I met with my writers’ group, the Train Wreckers. They usually have to include me in their monthly meetings via Skype, so it was a great treat to be able to meet with them face-to-face in a wonderfully productive meeting. (They are critiquing my novel-in-progress chapter by chapter.) I also met with my Wisconsin book group – a fabulous group of women – to discuss We Had It So Good by Linda Grant (see “From the Nightstand”) and reconnected with wonderful friends on the Lac du Flambeau Ojibwe reservation where I worked for fourteen years before moving to St. John’s. An exhausting but delightful trip. Not yet ready to get back to work.