Travel has many advantages, one of them being how it shakes me out of my routine. It forces me to take a few risks, talk to people more than I would otherwise. It’s hard to be bored when I’m traveling. Tired, nervous and hungry, maybe. But never bored.

Sometimes, even traveling to work will do that. Today was one of those days.

With the two main subway lines coming in from the west partially shut down due to smoke in the tunnels, I took a bus I’d never taken before.  It was a jolly crew of commuters and travelers crammed together, many of us standing.

I chatted with a young couple from Slovenia. She was model-caliber gorgeous. He spoke excellent English, had a pierced eyebrow and wore a button that said, “Ask me how to lose weight.” (I didn’t.)

“Slovenia is small, but we are mighty,” he said, reeling off names of some of its famous citizens, including First Lady Melania Trump and various sports figures I’d never heard of. But he was so proud of his small country that he made me want to go there immediately!

All this is to say that when I got off the bus at Rosslyn, I barely knew where I was.