endorphin: any of a group of hormones secreted within the brain and nervous system and having a number of physiological functions. They are peptides that activate the body's opiate receptors, causing an analgesic effect.ORIGIN 1970s: blend of endogenous and morphine. (online dictionary)

Now that's something i didn't know, that endorphin is a portmanteau word (Lewis Carroll's term for blended, made-up words). I thought of it this morning as I was swimming - outdoors, at last - and felt the endorphins swim into me, like dolphins, no relation . I knew the word, knew that an endorphin (only one?) is supposed to make you feel euphoric - well - more cheerful, anyway. Exercise is good for you, that's the message. I wonder: can you have too many endorphins? Sure, they're the antidote to stress. Feeling good kind of reduces the stress level, but too much? What if you relax so much and your stress level drops so low that you stop making the effort?

Most of what we do, so I am told, is motivated by fear. We are afraid of what will happen if we don't meet the deadline, fulfill our obligations to others, or observe the rules, whatever they are. When someone is really stressed out about a possible consequence, the reassuring (?) question is "What's the worst could happen?" That's supposed to make you feel better? Just losing your job or your partner or your life savings or an arm or a leg , but not your life? I guess such considerations help you to put your qualms in perspective so you don't stress out. And endorphins calm you down.

So there I was, swimming outdoors on a summer morning and feeling better in spite of concrete dust in my lungs (from the balcony renovation) and a writer's block about a new outline for the book I then must re-write after I figure it out, and I felt good. Almost good enough to play hooky. But not today.

Later: I did, though. I did play hookey -alternate spelling.

"Perhaps the future of the travel book is the travel blog."

Paul Theroux said that, and he should know; he's one of the top travel writers in the world. I thought at first he was kind of crotchety, not such fun or as kind or funny as Bill Bryson, who looks for a laugh and also for the best in people. But that was before I read The Great Railway Bazaar, Theroux's first and greatest travel book. Anyone who can put up with the discomforts (to say the least ) of travel the way he did/does is allowed to be crotchety.

There have been vicarious travellers in the past. They're the people who read Lonely Planet and who pay close attention to travel guides and memoirs, but who are not wild about travelling themselves. I remember a postcard my mother wrote me from a southern cruise she was taking. She wrote: "We're crossing The Great Barrier Reef. I must look it up in the Encyclopaedia Britannica when I get home. Did I dell you that rye is 75 cents a drink on board?" She really did not enjoy travelling, and there are others like her: people who like to say they've been there (wherever) but who don't enjoy it at the time. Better in the telling.

These are the people who would enjoy reading a travel blog, as Theroux surmised. No effort, no waiting, no bugs or heat, no risks - just the vicarious pleasure of someone else's experiences. Magic Carpet, at someone else's expense.

I'm counting on it.