I’m down in Virginia at my company’s home office again. Once again I am enjoying the modern-stylings of the aLoft hotel. Incidentally, I am leaning toward uh-loft as the proper pronounciation since I’ve noticed heavy use of the word “aloha” in their corporate personality. The desk guy said, “Aloha” when I checked in. The room key card has ‘aloha’ printed in the top corner. The recorded woman’s voice on the wake up call opened with the greeting “Aloha!”

So.

Last night we had a nice dinner at a sushi place. I had a ridiculous plate of many colors and ate every single bite. It was quite nice.

There were about 10 of us, and for a long stretch of the conversation we talked vacations. As usual I was in the minority. There was a lot of talk of Outer Banks rentals, Key West, Aruba and the Bahamas. Las Vegas also came up a few times. Nobody, though, mentioned Branson, MO. I considered bringing up the Vegas of the midwest, but the convo took a turn and I forgot all about it.

Eventually somebody posed the question to me – where would I like to go. I gave it some thought and realized where my top destination pick is right now: Portugal. It just came to me, but after further thought, I’m sticking with it right now.

I’d definitely love to return to France. Spain and Italy both call to me as well. But right now, I think Portugal is my top pick. I’ love to sample some real Port, in-country. I’d also like to explore the wines a bit more. In the past years I have uncovered a few real Portugese gems of the luscious red variety. There was a pretty great syrah from Fado. And they had an inexpensive blend of syrah, Touriga Nacional and some other stuff that was a pretty yummy every day. And who could forget Cortes de Cima.

Yeah, Portugal. So, if you’re looking for a late birthday gift, or maybe early Christmas…

wink wink.