Grandparents and marriage

So, my grandparents are visiting for the week. It's been quite interesting. My grandparents are in their eighties. My grandmother is very energetic, excited about keeping herself as active as possible in her old age. My grandfather is more inclined to sit quietly.

I am learning a lot from the brief time I'm spending with them. It's most interesting to see how my grandparents marriage plays a huge part in their aging. Multiple times today, my grandfather told my grandma he loved her, to hear her almost automatic reply "Love you too precious". They were walking around the lake today and my grandfather made a remark about "when a girl gets married...", basically detailing how a wife is supposed to take care of her husband. My grandmother has so much patience. I doubt my grandfather would survive without her.

A good friend of mine is getting married in a few weeks, and another just got engaged a few weeks ago. As they look forward to their new lives, I wish them all happiness, but I can't help but wonder what changes will come about in my friends if/when they hit the 50+ years of marriage mark my grandparents have reached.

Armchair traveling

I have never wanted to travel - something many of my friends think is absolutely crazy. But personally, flying makes me sick, driving is tedious, and being away from home for long periods of times makes me sad. 

However, I recently came across the phrase "armchair traveler" which I think describes me perfectly. I love reading my friends blogs. When Travis was in Chile, I loved his blog updates, and Hannah's Oman blog, while sporadic, is really cute and consistent with her personality. I also read travel books, which right now means "Bella Tuscany" by Frances Mayes. I enjoy reading about other people's adventures, but I'm not brave enough to have adventures of my own.

I know people say travel is how they can experience other cultures, but I respectfully think that you don't need to travel somewhere else to experience and respect other cultures.

Now, I know most of my readers are the traveling type, so here are some questions for you to comment on:

1. Where is the one place you think everyone should go?

2. Why are you drawn to travel?

3. How do you contribute towards "armchair travelers"?

Also, this month marks five years of my rambling thoughts bring written down on this blog. Momentous! I know I haven't been around much in 2013 so I'll try to keep posting over the summer. Stay cool :)

Blog Stats

I find my blog statistics fascinating. I have enabled my blog to be searchable on Google, which diversifies my stats a fair bit. Here's some of the data, from blogger:

1. By country: My primary viewership is from the US, followed by Russia, Germany, Canada, and the UK.
2. By post: my most popular posts are the ones that I have embedded photos. Generally, 20 views per post
3. By browser: fifty percent of my views are from Chrome (probably my own views of my own blog)

My posts have increased in number every year, but considering that I'm not doing BEDA (Blog Every Day in April) this year, I don't know that it will happen in 2013.