Cancer Survivor, writing about Health and Fitness as you age

Yes, well, that really is a message to me. I've been back from my trip to Trinidad for almost two weeks now. We made it to and from, safe and sound. And what have I been doing since I've been back? As little as possible - and you would know that was pretty much the situation even before I left! Ok, so my report from my trip. First let's start with food. I was pleasantly surprised that my constitution held up the whole time, despite having "doubles" with pepper almost every day after not eating it in 6 years. I ate mango amchar (more pepper), curried duck and goat while avoiding "bellywuk", aka diarrhoea. Baby Liam did me proud by chowing down on some dhaal (split peas), rice and curried goat - my son! I also gave him some doubles (without pepper) from a roadside vendor which he tried like a trooper! Ooops, maybe Gunnar didn't know that.. I was not able to get Gunnar, Lucas or Liam to like coconut water though, so I'll just have to keep on ...

Yes, so I said "Crap!" out loud and Lucas, my 7-year old asked me who that was...so I had to explain that I used that term as an expression of frustration. My innocent Lucas. But it reminds me that I need to be careful about what I say in front of my baby parrot, Liam. I will be undertaking, the highly inadvisable, stress-inducing, international-flight-with-lap-child come the end of the month, and I expect that I will be inclined to use much stronger terms as I hustle through 2 airplane changes, customs and immigration. It will be 6 years since I was last in Trinidad and while I am excited to be back home, I cannot help but feel some degree of trepidation about the visit. Don't get me wrong, if it was just me, no problem, but I have a vague sense of unease about exposing my very American-sounding and American-looking children to a third world country in this present climate. It is very difficult to explain to anyone who has not been outside the United States how much...