Today I leave to spend a week in Dallas, Texas; the easternmost point I've ever been to. Possibly the southernmost. My intention is to keep some sort of diary of my trip. This seemed like a good idea until I came here to post my pre-trip thoughts, and discovered I had none.

The weather in Dallas is stormy and quite a bit cooler than here, where we are enjoying, if that is quite the right term for a major climatic change, near record highs. Seventy-five degrees and clear blue skies is almost perfect weather for me personally, but, you know, maybe not in winter, which is a quaint season we used to have back in the 20th century.

Anyway, my bags are packed and my observational tools are ready. (A notepad from Wal-Mart, a disposable camera from Best Buy, rung up by a woman named Orchid; a pen I got at an agricultural conference.)

Step one: the long drive to Seattle.

(I probably won't be able to update this until I get back, so don't expect real-time blogging, but more of a trip-in-retrospect series later.)