Citizens of the World: A Stoic Podcast for Curious Travelers - How to House-Sit Your Way Around the World and Other Free Accommodation Travel Tips

Episode Date: March 20, 2018

Travel expert Jema Patterson from the site 'Half the Clothes' discusses how to house-sit around the world and other free accommodation travel tips on this week’s episode of the Postcard Academy (visit postcardacademy.co for detailed show notes).   We break down the best and worst house-sitting sites, how to write a profile that will get homeowners to choose you, and other important information you need to get into house-sitting. Even if you find the idea of living in someone else’s house insane, hopefully you’ll still get some educational value out of this episode.   Jema has been wandering the globe non-stop since 2010 and just started a podcast called Ticket 2 Blog, the no-BS podcast about how to be a blogger and a nomad (without losing your mind or selling your soul).    We literally talked for hours, so I narrowed down our conversation to focus on house-sitting, work exchanges, and other ways to score cheap or free accommodation around the world.    In other news, I just wrote a blog post on Medium titled Women Don’t Need to be in Crisis to Travel.    Not long ago, a guy asked me if I was traveling so much because I had a divorce to work through. It was an innocent question. And who can blame him for it? Most films and books about female travelers are about women in crisis struggling to find themselves.    Yes, those stories are important and have inspired many people. But a lot of us already know who we are. In fact, that’s a big reason why I started this podcast — to share more stories of women who are out there exploring this world simply because they want to. My guest today is one of those fun and fierce women.        The Postcard Academy podcast is hosted by me, Sarah Mikutel. You can sign up for my newsletter here, if you so please. And thank you so much for listening to this show. I know you’re busy and have many listening options, so it means a lot to me that you’re here. You are the best.    Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free Conversation Cheat Sheet with simple formulas you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you’re in a meeting or just talking with friends.Download it at sarahmikutel.com/blanknomore and start feeling more confident in your conversations today.

Welcome to the Postcard Academy, your weekly travel and culture podcast. I'm your host, Sarah Mikital, and I am back in London. I feel a bit like I cheated on my city with Mexico last week, but I am very happy to be back in the UK, and my mother is visiting me, so all as well. Before we jump into our interview, I'd like to thank all of you who have already subscribed to the show, and to those of you who have left a review on Apple Podcasts. I love reading them, and your feedback means so much, so thank you. you. And a very special welcome to you, new listeners. It's been especially fun hearing from you. I've

actually been hearing more from the guys, and I'd love to hear more from my fellow female travelers out there. In fact, I just wrote a blog post on Medium titled Women Don't Need to Be in Crisis to Travel. Not long ago, the guy asked me if I was traveling so much because I had a divorce to work through. And it was an innocent enough question, and I don't blame him for it. Because most films and books out there about female travelers are about women in crisis. struggling to find themselves. And yes, those stories are important and they've inspired many people, but a lot of us already know who we are. In fact, that's a big reason why I started this podcast to share more stories of women who are out there exploring this world simply because they want to.

My guest today is one of those women. I'm speaking with travel expert Gemma Patterson from Half the Clothes.com and how to house sit around the world. We break down the best and worse house-sitting sites, how to write a profile that will get homeowners to choose you, and other important information you need to know to get into house-sitting. Gemma has been wandering the globe non-stop since 2010 and just started a podcast called Ticket to Blog. That's Ticket the number two blog, the No BS podcast on how to be a blogger and a nomad without losing your mind or selling your soul. We literally talked for hours, so I narrowed down our conversation to focus on house-sitting, work exchanges, and all of that.

other ways where you can score cheaper free accommodation around the world. Even if you find the idea of living in someone else's house insane, hopefully you'll still get some educational value out of this episode. Now into my conversation with Gemma. Welcome, Gemma. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast today. I'm so excited. So where are you from in the U.S.? And where are you right now?

Well, I grew up in the Wild West, basically. I was literally a coal miner's daughter. I grew up in Wyoming, which is the least populated state in the nation, which is unusual because it's enormous. It's the ninth largest state. And so it's just really super isolated. It's two hours from my little tiny Wyoming town, not even that tiny, like 20,000 people, to the nearest shopping mall.

Wow. And six hours to a proper city. Like the closest city is Denver, and there's as many people in Denver, actually now double the amount of people in Denver as there are in the entire state of Wyoming, right? So I grew up in a place where there's plenty of boredom on hand to turn you into a wanderer. So that's sort of my background short version. So when did you start? So I have this story that I always tell.

My coal mining father had this schedule. They're kind of like nurses in a way, you know, like they have these 12-hour shifts, right? And so a cool thing about having that lifestyle is sometimes you can sort of finangle your days off and you can get them all crammed together. And suddenly you can have like a week. and a half or even two weeks off work. So I got to do a lot of camping with my family growing up, long camping trips, not just for the weekend, like going out for a week and a half. And my dad's always, he's definitely an explorer at heart and always wanting to see what's

around the next bend. So I picked that up from him on all of our hikes. And then when I was eight, this is the story I always tell. When I was eight, we went on this trip to Canada, to the national parks. And when we were coming back into the U.S., you know, you're getting to. the border and as a kid this means nothing to you and I'm standing there bored out of my mind and I see the welcome to Canada sign and I realize if I were to walk over and be on the other side of that sign I would be in a different country than my family and what like how cool would that

be like I'd go by to another country by myself as an eight year old right like that's what's going through my eight year old brain that is pretty cool I I don't even ask. I'm just like going for it. Like I'm definitely going to put my toe on the other side of that line. And so I start walking and my parents are like, no, what do you? No, get back here. What, why are you still moving? Stop moving. What are you doing? And I'm sure the border official is like, what's going on with this family? I got in so much trouble for that. So I mean, maybe I started wandering when I was eight or something. I know that excitement because as an adult, I was visiting a friend who grew up in East Germany and we went for a walk and then there was like this pole that just marked where Poland began. I was like, I can just walk right over into Poland. So I did. That's the only time I've been to Poland was stepping over into it for like a few minutes. It's funny how much we care about these imaginary lines, but they're pretty deeply significant, right? Yeah. So you left for New Zealand, much farther away in 2010. Why did you?

did you choose New Zealand? So when I finally left the U.S., I'd actually quit my desk job, like six months before that, maybe, and I had these great adventures, and I went sailing for weeks at a time with friends and these crazy places in Canada and Washington. But I was having a lot of American adventures. I spent a summer going to a bunch of weddings, and after six months of that, my partner at the time and I were getting like a little nervous about money. like we both planned okay we're going to quit our jobs and travel but we have to go to these

weddings first so we'll do that and I guess we'll do these other things and I guess we'll do these other things so when it was finally time to go abroad why New Zealand is because we looked at some options and we thought well we probably should start out our abroad adventures with some work because a lot of a lot of people who travel abroad like you I mean money runs out right Right. So we were looking at working holiday visas, which is programs that you can, like Canada, the U.S., Australia, New Zealand, and a couple of other places give you an opportunity to come and be, you know, sort of migrant labor in their countries and also teaching English. But South Korea was like two months to get the visa. And we just, we didn't want to wait. And we both love the outdoors. I think we probably ended up hiking like 500 kilometers at least of the backcountry trails in New Zealand. So New Zealand was our choice because it was fast and it wasn't too expensive. The visa for Australia is maybe double that. And then, of course, we could just be outside all the time.

Very cool. So how long did you stay? I was in New Zealand for a year. Then I've been traveling since then ever since. I mean, my goal was to travel for a year and then I just never stopped. So would you say that you have a particular first? home these days or it's home just everywhere? It's really been everywhere for eight years, which is kind of crazy. I mean, I worked this six-month job in Australia working industrial

construction and I'd get on a plane and fly a thousand miles to this mine site in the middle of nowhere in the desert and I'd work there for 28 days and then I'd fly back to the city for six days. And, you know, so I mean, technically I had this address in Perth, Australia, but I was never there. Technically, I lived in this, like, little prison cell at the mine. To you. I would love to hear more about the prison cell. Actually, before I move on, tell me more about that.

To house people, I mean, this is a thing in Australia, right? Like, Australia is very, I don't know if it'd be fair to say, underpopulated, but it's about the size of America. America, don't quote me, but, you know, 300 million plus is how many people live in America. and Australia has, oh, I'm trying to do the fast math, 1-15th, 20 million people, ish, I mean, a little bit more than that. Yeah, so like there's nobody there. And there's also kind of, oh, I hope no Australians are listening. I don't mean it this way, you guys, there's kind of nothing there.

I mean, they've like the most beautiful coastline in the world, best kept secret, more beautiful than any beaches I've ever seen in Thailand or Indonesia or the Philippines. Australian beaches are hands down the best. but the whole middle of the country is just totally empty, right? So anyway, there's this long tradition of going to the, and then empty except for all these minerals. So all these Australians are going to the middle of nowhere and working. And they even have a word for it, FIFO, fly in, fly out. Like people are working FIFO jobs.

Okay. And this has been going on for decades. You've got to house people, right? They can't go home at night. but you need to do it cheaply. I mean, I talked to some guys who were doing this in the 70s, and they had like really hard, intense housing conditions, if you could even call it that.

Now it's a lot better, but basically they just divide a shipping container into four rooms that have a bed and a bathroom and a desk and a closet. And, like, I mean, can you imagine how big a shipping container is and now think of it like it's four people's lives? So you're just living in the middle of nowhere in a shipping container? Like is it a kind of a party atmosphere? Or is it just like how long would you do? Like I guess I'm trying to think why would you do this? Is it just a quick way to make money and

then you can move on? Money. Yeah. So I don't know. People are like, am I being rude talking about money? I'm just going to tell you. I had this like plebeian job. And I made about $10,000 a month as just a total plebe. Right? So So like that's 120 grand a year being a plebe. The men that I was working with were making two, three times that. So it's so much money. It's just this, it's an irresistible amount of money. I mean, talk about golden handcuffs.

My God, I could do that for a month. Right? Then you can go live in Slovenia for like the year. But that's what happens is you do it and you're just like, this money is just coursing through your life and you just keep going like, I could do it for a few more months. I could do it for a few more months until you do it for like 20 years. But it's pretty, it's pretty soul-sucking, honestly, to live in like a prison cell and never see your friends and family.

And like, you don't get to build relationships with your friends and family. And everybody you're with is also in this situation. So, you know, I don't regret it, but I definitely can't really recommend. And anyway, the whole point of this question was like, you know, do I move around or do I, like, did I live there? Is that where I lived? Does that count as living somewhere for six months? Because I left every 28 days for a week? Or did I live in the city? Because that's where I got mail? I don't know if I... Yeah. I don't know where I live if I live. If I live. I think you don't need to have a permanent home. Why not? People keep asking me that this year. Because I, you know, usually I live in London. But this year, I want to try out digital nomad life. So I just want to live in a bunch of places. Where are you right now? London. And but past... April, I don't know. So I might go back to Italy or I might go to Romania or Slovenia, because my previous podcast guests have really, you know, influenced me in a positive way about these.

Of course. And thank goodness I have parents. You are kind enough to accept mail. Do your parents take mail for you? People ask me that question all the time. So no worries. If you don't have parents that will do this for you, there are services. They're like 10 bucks a month. They'll get your mail for you. They'll take your mail for you. They'll take. pictures of it and then like anything you want them to open you pay per piece that you want them to open and like scan what's inside and all the junk mail they'll just like put it in the shredder for you but yeah but yeah my my mom is a highly capable really awesome person who will definitely get my mail for me i really want to talk to you about house sitting because i know that this is something that you do a lot to save money when you travel so to start what is house sitting i think most people would define it as taking care of someone else's home and probably their pets while

they're away. But I think that it's also important to remember that you're essentially living someone's life for them, right? Like if their pets are on a schedule, you know, you can try and deviate from that, but I don't know if you've ever, like farmers know this when there's daylight savings. The cows don't care that the clocks change. They're like, nope, this is the time we're awake, and it's right now. You know, so I think that it's important to remember that house sitting is not just, oh, I've got a free place to stay and whatever. Like, you're doing someone else's life for them, all these little components, and you're using all of the appliances that they picked out that are special to them and sitting on the furniture that they picked out that's special to them. You're so right about animals and they've got their own little clocks.

I was at my grandmother's house watching Shark Tank and her dog, like, around 9 p.m. It's like, it's time for me to go to bed. I want to go to bed. Uh-huh. Yeah, so I totally get it. So what made it motivated you to start house sitting and living other people's lives? So initially, okay, I do have to say, I might have sounded from the last thing I said that I'm not into that. I'm so into it. I think that living other people's lives is, I've got so many ways in my life that I do this. And I think it's so incredibly fulfilling. So I was doing this other thing, living other people's life, called a, called a work exchange, which is really incredibly fulfilling. You basically trade four hours of your time per day in exchange for room and board. And you get to live with a local family and you get to be part of the fabric of their lives. And it's just so cool.

And such an incredible way to explore any area. You have this instant network of friends and connections. It's really, really cool. But I'm an introvert. Me too. But you wouldn't know it from hearing us. Exactly. Well, it's not like I don't like talking.

I just need a lot of time to myself to recharge. Yeah, yeah, that's true. Yeah, and maybe you'll relate to this one. I'm also a people pleaser. Does that happen to you? Yeah. Yeah. So these super fulfilling situations where I'm in somebody's house and their life

and like being a really great guest all the time gets pretty, gets exhausting, right? and I don't like hotels. I feel like they're super lonely. I do love Airbnb's, but also like none of us are made of money. Well, I mean, if you are made of money, I would like you to contact me and maybe we should be friends. Contact us. Whoever's out there who wants to be Airbnb friends with us. Right.

So that's how I got into house sitting is like, okay, I'm doing this thing that I really, really like, but I'm just not. I wasn't I wasn't recharging as much as I really need to. And I wasn't focusing on my own goals. I mean, the first time I really, really started house sitting, I was in Australia, and I was supposed to be getting a job because I had this working holiday visa, but I was having so much fun doing these work exchanges that I just kept, like, I just didn't make time in my day to job hunt, right? And the clock's ticking.

Like, I have to get out of this country. Oh gosh, now it's down to eight months. Like, I really better find a job so soon. So I went and did a house. I was a week and a half. And after that, I was just like, oh, my gosh, this is magic for me. I can do this really cool thing with people that's so fulfilling. And then I can switch to this other lifestyle where I'm still connected with people.

And, you know, I'm helping these people and I'm getting to know their neighbors, but also having lots of time to myself. So I loved it. So really quick before we proceed with house sitting, the work exchange, that sounds really fun. Is there a certain group that you would recommend? What kind of jobs were you doing? The top two sites I would recommend are Workaway and Hippo help. Workaway is, I actually used to not like them, but they've come out as the industry leader and they're doing a good job. And I really, I'm a pretty opinionated person.

I don't know if that's become obvious. So I used to be kind of anti them, but now I love them. Why didn't you like them and what changed? I just thought that I didn't like their pricing structure. I thought that they were kind of like nickel and diming people. Workaway has totally changed. I can really feel like their values have shifted. They're not trying to squeeze you into like whatever.

And their pricing structure is awesome, especially compared to what else is going on in that industry. So work way is great. And then this new guy made this platform called Hippo Help and it's free. So you have to pay for Workaway. Hippo help is free. But because it's new, it's still getting populated. So definitely I would always check out Hippo Help. to see if it's what's going on in my area.

And then workaway's just been around long enough that it has most of the jobs. So what you're doing in these jobs, it ranges enormously. I've scraped anti-fowl off the whole of a yacht in New Zealand, which sounds awful. It was great. We had so much fun because we were with this super cool family

and we were just laughing and joking all day. In New Zealand, I was getting. giving a pony a haircut and just, you know, weeding the vegetable garden. I've milked sheep in Italy. That was super fun and made cheese. That does sound fun. Oh, my gosh.

There's so many cool things you can learn. And I've built a lot of things, fences, QE trellises. I mean, really, just whatever skills you have that you can bring to a property. Because if you think about it, we're all basically these days trying to have our own village, right? Like it's you and maybe your partner and you've got your house with your two or three bedrooms and your couple of bathrooms and your garage and your cars and the toys in the garage and like never any time, right? We're all trying to run our own little personal two-person villages. And so when you join someone else's village and you show up in their life with energy to contribute to things that they never have time to get around to, they love it. And there's so many things to do that most places you just get to pick what you're into.

They're like, okay, here's the 10,000 things I wish existed in my life. What are you like doing, you know? And are you on your own or with other people? It depends. Some places I've been, you know, you'll be there with a couple of other volunteers. I would say the majority I'm, I or like the person I'm traveling with, the two of us are the only people there. But that's kind of a personal choice. Like I said, I'm an introvert.

Like it sounds really overwhelming to me to be at a place where there's like 19 other workers and I'm working with them all day long. Right. Scary. Okay. Well, all right, I'm definitely going to check that out. Sounds fascinating. Where are you in the world right now? I just finished a house sit in Portland, Oregon.

And before that, I was visiting friends in Philadelphia. And before that, I was climbing Mount Washington. And I guess I could keep going. But where am I now, Portland, Oregon? Do available house sits determine where you're going to go next? Sometimes. I mean, I'm sure as a traveler, you relate to this. Like, is there one thing that determines where you're going next? You know, I've lived more of an expat life than a digital nomad life. You know, I live in London. That's where everything is. I still love traveling. But London is like my home and my base. And then everything else tends to be, you know, a weekend or a week. Or if I'm doing something like more slow travel, two months in Italy, say. But I haven't. I haven't. I haven't lived the type of life where you're living where you're always somewhere else and you don't really know where you're going to be in six months.

So for me, this is a completely different world. Okay. So I just got the impression like, oh, look at how much she's traveling. And I just did that funny thing where you assume everyone else is just like you. I'm an aspiring, Jemma. Okay. So sometimes I'm in like mostly house sitting mode, you know, like I'm working on a project or something. just want to mostly be house sitting. But then you also, we all want to spend time with our

friends and family, right? So a lot of times I'm thinking about where those things fit in. I went to circus school for six months of 2016. So I did a little bit of house sitting while I was in circus school. Wait a minute. Circus school. I know crazy, right? What made you decide to do that? Are you performing now? Oh, I wanted to do it my whole life because who doesn't love to play? I mean, Oh, it's so much fun. Really, really fun. I'm not performing because this ties in with what I was just saying. When are performances, they're nights, weekends, and summertime.

And I really value getting to spend a lot of time with my friends and family. And when are they available? Nights, weekends, and summertime. So I love circus, but I love my friends and family. Maybe not even that much more, just a tiny bit more. But enough that I'm not a circus performer. So it was just something you always wanted to do when you made it happen. Yep.

That's so cool. Back to house sitting. Is that what we were talking about? I'm pretty sure that's what this was supposed to be about. Yeah, house sitting. Great. Let's do it. What's been your best experience so far?

Good question. I don't yet have any like this like French villa mansion in the countryside where I got massages and fed by the butler every day because I guess the butler would be taking care of the house. You're just watching the cat. I think probably my favorite house that was in Kansas City. And I think I just loved it because the homeowner was really cool. She was just so fun.

I actually went to Kansas City for a storytelling conference earlier this year. And I ended up staying with her. And she's just great. She was so fun to be with. Her cats are really cool. She lives in a beautiful neighborhood. Kansas City is just such a cool city. And it was the place where I took my first trapeze lesson.

So I think probably that could be the whole reason. Was that before a circus school? Yep, it was. And Kansas City, so you went back there for storytelling, but what made you interested in Kansas City? Not knocking it, but it's an unusual choice. Isn't it, though? Isn't it though?

I have a friend who lives in Omaha, Nebraska. And so I was just trying to find something that would be, relatively near her so that I could coordinate a visit with her on either side of the house sit. So how much money do you think house sitting has saved you over the years? Gosh, that's really hard to say. Okay, I kind of try to think about it like this. Because, I mean, what you're really asking is how much money could someone else save,

right? Yeah. Like, okay. So my personal life is just this mix of so many variables that I wouldn't dare try to extrapolate it and apply it to someone else. But like, okay, let's just say average rent in right now, like, and the people in my little echo chamber is like maybe they're paying $200 to $400 a week in rent. And so if you just multiply that by, I don't know, if you're a house sitting for half the

year, like that's $5 to $10,000 you're not paying in rent. So, I mean, if you're really house sitting full time and it works out for you that you're kind of bouncing from sit to sit to sit to sit, yeah, maybe $20,000 possibly. I love this idea of discovering the world just by going to available house sits. But how difficult is it to score a house sitting opportunity? I imagine it's quite competitive, especially if you're wanting to do it in London or something like that. It is, it depends.

Yeah, if you're wanting to house sit in like a really popular area, the homeowners post an ad and then they get so many messages that they have to like take the ad down, right? So that happens. Or even if it's not in a really high demand area, if there's like a six-month house sit in rural Minnesota, six, people underestimate, and you're a traveler, so you'd relate to this. People underestimate how much mental energy it takes to travel. So I have a friend who just got back from Italy, and it was her first trip abroad. And when I said, okay, I asked her, what did you learn? You know, I mean, aside from like the fountains and whatever, like, what did you learn about yourself? What did you learn about travel?

And she said, it was so exhausting. You just don't think about all these little micro decisions that you don't have to make in your daily life. Like you don't have to wake up and think, okay, now where's the bathroom? And do I need to bring toilet paper with me? And how do I get coffee? And what's the word for it again? The kind that I like. Oh, I need to look that up.

Oh, but the Wi-Fi's not working. I think I forgot to get the password. What time does the front desk open? Like all these tiny little decisions that you don't really think about it until you need to go to bed at like 7.30 p.m. Because you're so tired, you know? Right. So what should people do if they're interested in house sitting?

Step one. Think about why. If you're only interested in house sitting because it's a way to get free accommodation, that might not be quite enough to enjoy it. There are these two women who run a thing called the House Sitting Academy. They're these cool Australian women, and they train up house sitters. And they really talk about how important it is to be service-minded, which as soon as I heard them say it, I was like, oh, yeah, that's exactly it. Because you're helping other people with their lives.

So if you're not excited about that, you probably won't have a lot of fun house sitting. You know, if you're thinking more about what you're going to be getting out of it, it actually won't be that fun for you. Right. And I'm guessing you would have to be a pet lover because this probably involves a lot of pet sitting, right? Definitely. Yeah. If you don't love pets, certainly there are house sits out there. Like, I just saw, I got asked to do a two-week house sit because this guy has this super crazy fancy.

see studio, recording studio, full of like hundreds of thousands of dollars of recording equipment. So he's basically terrified to leave his property unoccupied. Okay. So, I mean, there's that. And he was not advertising on a platform. That was like through a friend. So there are sits that don't involve pets, but generally most sits do involve taking care of a pet.

And then after you know that you, why you want to do it and you're on board with that, then it's great to get experience. because homeowners need reassurance. So you can just reach out to your friends and family and tell them, hey, I want to start doing this house-sitting thing. If you guys are going away for the weekend, be sure to think of me. Like, I'd be happy to watch your dog or whatever, just to kind of get references so that they'll have something to say about how you were with their pet.

You can get on, there's a platform called Rover, which is not really a house-sitting website, but it can be, and it's very location-dependent. So there's a rover for your city where you are, and you can walk people's pets on their lunch, like for their lunch, or you can sometimes have them in your home. There's ways to take care of other people's pets on Rover and get paid for it. So that's a cool way to start. And then think about what you want in a pet or in a house sit eventually.

Like, do you want to go for a long time? Are there locations that you're really interested in? And then eventually you'll have to join a house sitting platform. but I encourage people don't commit to a platform until you find a house sit on it that you really want. I mean, maybe it's not going to work out. Don't think that you're going to pay your 50 bucks or 117 if you're a certain platform that I really don't like. Don't think that you're just going to pay that money and then definitely get that house sit. But that's how I decide which platform I'm going to sign up for right at that minute.

Can we talk about your favorite house sitting sites? So my favorite, so I actually wrote, I have a really popular house sitting article called the best and worst house sitting websites. And I think it's popular because there's a lot of dishonesty specifically around house sitting websites. With house sitting, man, I just feel like every article is like, oh, this site could be good and this site could be good and this site could be good. And nobody's saying here's what sucks about this site. because all of these most house sitting websites have affiliate programs. So if you convince somebody to like take the leap and use this platform, then you're going to get some money out of it, right?

And so it's just very disappointing to me that there's so many articles out there that are just going like, oh yeah, well, I could see how this one would be good. And I mean, I said before I'm way too judgmental. So probably I could stand to be a little bit. Honest, perhaps. Is the word honest, perhaps? Like, we need some honest reviews, right? If we're living somewhere, we don't want to end up in a horror show.

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, sometimes I ask myself maybe if I shouldn't be quite so ruthless. But you know what? The way it is today, I am. And so I thought somebody needs to write about this stuff, especially because I guess I'm going to tell you my least favorite one first. Everybody was raving about trusted house sitters. And I think they're the worst. platform, okay, that's not super fair to say, okay, I hate, I think they nickel and dime people.

I think they're one of those websites that's trying to constantly force you to do things that you don't really want to do, like putting up little walls, like, oh, yeah, you can do this as soon as you do the thing we want. And there are $117 last I checked, which is like double what some of my favorite websites are or like triple. And I just don't think they provide a great service. Like, yeah, their website looks pretty and they'll say that they some, one, some award for design, but like when it comes to actually looking through house sits and functionally

trying to find a place to house sit, it's awful. They let homeowners make these profiles that say, I'll need a house sitter someday. So you might search like Portland, Oregon and go, oh, cool, there's 70 house sits. And then like you're clicking through the ads and it takes a lot of time because their setup is not good. And then you realize 68 of them are people who live in Portland that at some point in time will need a house sitter, but like there's actually only two house sits in Portland, you know? Yes, it's not easy to navigate, but I guess they've won the marketing more since they're the most popular one.

I have faith that if there are enough of us who start talking honestly about this, and also just people's experience, I think once people keep having this experience, hopefully, I don't know. I don't know if I can say that. But I do have favorites. House carers is my favorite. And just because they've been around for a long time, I've never personally talked to the guy who runs it, but he has a super good reputation.

among all the house sitters I know, like people who have met him or engaged with him sometimes, he's just got really good values. He hasn't put his prices up in years because he's like, this is what it's worth, you know? And I mean, he could easily start charging more,

but he hasn't done that. And the platform is well done. Like everything that you need from a house sitting platform is there. I do have to say that it's old. I mean, it's been around forever. And I don't know if you know anything about tech, but like each time you're,

iterating in technology, you kind of have to reorganize these massive amounts of data and it's really hard and really expensive, which is why you get some of these websites, not just house-sitting, but like kind of any website in the world that's, you know, really usage heavy and it kind of looks like it's still 1990s because it's really hard to make the shift to pretty. So that's kind of the only thing that I don't like about them, but I really, their ads are great. I don't feel like they're wasting my time. I'm never clicking on something that isn't relevant to what I want. So yeah, House Carers is great. And then Nomador. Oh, sorry. Before we move on to Nomador, how much is House Carers? The fee? 50 bucks a year. And I mean, he's got to change it someday because of inflation, right? But

it's been like that for ages. And I have no reason to believe that it'll be going up anytime soon. Okay. Great. Thank you. And then Nomador. How much is Nomador? Oh, I'll tell you, free. Okay, not like 100% free. You have to pay people for their time and effort that they put into making something really great for you, right? But it is free for your first three contacts. So if you find a house sit on there and it works out with one of those first three people you reach out to, then it was free.

Great. And then the other thing that Nomodore does that nobody else does, or at least not that I've found, that I really like, is they let you have a quarterly membership if you want, and that's 35 bucks. or yearly is $90. So that's really cool because if you're just, if you're thinking about house sitting, like, eh, probably maybe, I don't know, I guess I'll try it. It kind of sucks to be like, okay, I'm committing for a year.

This is an entire year membership, you know? So I think it's really cool that they kind of just let you do this tasting fee. And then because they're newer, they have a really pretty website and they do a really good job, as good as house carers, I would say, with like just having all the information about a sit really quickly. visually accessible so you're not digging through ads and oh and they protect house sitters i think this is really critical another site that i don't like is house sitter dot com and readers write in all the time asking me about this um other house sitters i know are getting they're on that site and they're getting spammed like they're getting homeowners writing to them that are that it's actually a spam thing and

you know potential like identity theft issues so norman noram protects house sitters from that they won't let homeowners click around and look at how sitting profiles unless they've had their identity verified. Like I think they have to send in like a picture of their passport or something. So that's super cool. And then they also, oh, and Nomadur has this two-way review system like Airbnb, right? So like all the other platforms are like, what did you think of this sitter? Right. But there are crazy homeowners. How about what I thought of you? Because that's important too. Yeah. I was actually just thinking about safety concerns because, you know, you could be going. I don't know why I'm having like these nightmare thoughts in my head. Have you like just showing up and then it just

actually being a crazy person. But in reality, I guess Airbnb is the same thing. It's not like they're running, doing these extensive, you know, background checks on every, anyone can just start an Airbnb today. Mm-hmm. Yep. So anyway, I like that Nomadar has that two-way review system. That make sense. And then you asked for three. So the third one is not a house sitting platform per se. It's this thing, I think I mentioned it before, called the House Sitting Academy. And before I go into talking about this, let me just tell you, it's money. Like, it's like $197, but I think they're having to put the price up soon because they've been, it's these, those two Australian women that I mentioned earlier, it's like their whole life's work. Like they're full-time house sitters. They've been doing it for

years, they're really good at packaging, like, how to do this. And I actually found them randomly. And I reached out to them and said, oh, my God, you guys are doing such a good job with this. And I'm never going to take the time to package all of my house sitting knowledge. Like, I would like to connect other people with what you're doing. Like, tell me more. Let me look at your products. Let me see, like, let me see what you're doing. And yeah, it's like there. So this house sitting an academy thing, the, just the, the PDF of like what you're, what you go through in the academy itself. It's nine pages, like just the outline is nine pages of here's what it covers. And they're really, they're really small.

Like they only let 10 people in at a time so they have time to give individual attention to every person and answer every single question. And then the reason I think of this as like a house-sitting platform in my head is because at the end of it, you get into this secret Facebook group where, because let me tell you what happens as a house sitter. Okay, this is a great example. I just this house set that I just finished in Portland, Oregon, this woman needs a house sitter for March 15th to April 15th. And she's like, would so love it if I could come back.

But I have a different life to live March 15th to April 15th. And that's what's always happening to house sitters. Like all these homeowners are always asking us to come back. They really liked us and they want us to be their person again. But like it just the schedule doesn't work out. So this Facebook group is where people are posting sits from. homeowners that have asked them. And it's cool because you know that the home's like not going to be crazy, right? You get to talk to somebody who's house sat there before personally and that can tell you

if there's any like quirks or whatever. And these homeowners also know what they're looking for in a house sitter. That's something that you don't necessarily get on a platform. And then, you know, if there's a communication issue, it can turn into a drama, you know. So, so the House Sicking Academy isn't a platform, but it's definitely good. I would even consider paying just to have access. Last night. I saw one on there for, I don't know if you know San Miguel de Allende. San Miguel is like this cool expat enclave in the mountains. Anyway, I saw, I like, I was like, ooh, should I go to Mexico? Like, could I go? So anyway, it's not, it's not a platform, but like people in this Facebook group are always giving jobs to each other. And it's so it's way less competitive than a platform.

And you can get access to that secret group if you go through the House Sitting Academy. Exactly. Yeah. And the Academy not only. talks about the, like, how to become a house sitter and how to market yourself and should you have your own website and like all of these and then how to deal with house sits and what's your checklist and how do you deal with homeowners and what, you know, what to do if this emergency thing happens. It also talks about like this nomad life. I think they interviewed like 60 people.

So they've got, you know, 30 to 60 stories about how people who are doing this in their 20s and people who are doing it who are retired and couples and singles and old and young and all that jazz very cool and so yeah you mentioned marketing yourself we are sort of competing against other people for these house sits so do you have any tips on what would make a good profile what are some things we should include yes uh put yourself in the homeowner's shoes think about what you would want to hear don't sit there and write like what i want to say about myself think about okay i'm about to hire a house sitter what do i want to know from them hires the wrong word a lot of these are unpaid but But, like, you know, I'm about to select.

And then answer the prompts. Like, I'm shocked. If I play homeowner on these platforms and click around, it was shocked at how many people just have like a two-sentence thing. Like, oh, yeah, I'm Tom and I like dogs and would love to house it for you sometime. So don't be that guy. Don't do that. And then, yeah, just talk about your experience with pets.

Did you have them growing up? Do you have favorites? And then again, with like, being an animal lover, say it if you're an animal lover. there's a woman who has a cool website where she blogs about her house sitting experiences. I think it's called Really Truly Living.com. And she talks a lot about what's involved with caring for pets and how to, I don't know if she talks about profile stuff. But, and then home care? Have you been a homeowner?

Can you empathize with being a homeowner? I mean, I've never owned a home, but I certainly know what it's like to take care of property. and do you have experience with like spas? Do you have any skills? Are you like, you know, handy if something breaks? Are you going to be able to fix it? And not that that's required, but something to put on your profile if you've got it. And then what will it be like for their pets?

Like, what will the experience be like for their pets? Because a lot of times they're like nine to fivers. So it's fun to tell them, like, I'm going to spoil your pets like crazy. I'm going to, I'm working from home. I'm going to be there all day, cuddling them all day long. They're going to love it. Like your pets are going to think it's the best thing that ever happened to them. and then what will it be like for their home?

Like, how do you, do you tend to pick things up? Do you tend to get the dishes done? Do you, I mean, I don't know if I'd go mentioning that I didn't, but if you do, if that's, and that's the truth, like, the neighbor's never going to come knock on the door and be like, whoa, big mess in the living room, you know? Like, say that. Those are all good ideas. And so say we get a house sit, what should be on our checklist of things to ask the homeowner,

just to make sure everything goes smoothly while we're, there? Basically, day-to-day operations? Like, what do the pets need? What do the plants need? What do you need? What about the mail? How does that work? Home security? How do they like their house to be secured? How the heat and AC work? I usually have them give me a tour of their house just to see it from their perspective because they'll, I also don't like opening 5,000 different cupboards trying to find a cheese grater or a certain type of, you know, sheet or pillowcase or something. So having that tour really helps you get oriented to somebody else's stuff and space. Find out if there are any quirks. Like, it was really helpful to know at this one place,

for instance, that the freezer would pop open really often. So, like, to be careful not to let the freezer run really hard because it's hanging open. You know, where are the cleaning supplies? Wi-Fi limit. In some countries in the world, Wi-Fi is not unlimited. So you need to know if it's okay for you to be on Skype for an hour with your family. And then emergencies, like how to deal with pet emergencies, vet phone numbers. If the pet's ever gotten lost, was it easy to get them back? How do they do it? If there's like an earthquake or something, how to shut off the utilities, if there's a fire,

how to turn off the electric panel to the house, what's the local 911? Not every country uses, most countries don't use 911. It's like triple zero or triple one. So just making sure you know those local numbers. And then info about their trip, emergency contacts while they're gone, any authorized contractors if somebody needs to come in and fix something. There's really, it's a lot. I mean, I always tell homeowners, this takes an hour.

So set aside an hour. This is how long it's going to take to go over this. Have you had any emergencies or any scary house sitting experiences? Oh, man. I've been so lucky. So I personally haven't. but I've heard so many stories. Those women, those Australian women I was talking about,

they actually did a podcast called House Sitting Legends. And they found, you know, scary can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. So like sometimes taking on a sit where the homeowner tells you their pet is terminally ill, and that might be something that comes up while you're there. That would be awful. Yeah. Yeah, intense. And then just today in that secret group I mentioned from the House Sitting Academy,

somebody was saying how they've found like hidden cameras. not, you know, yeah, like, this is so violating. That is creepy. Yeah, and if you're, like, terrified of snakes in your house sitting in the Ecuadorian jungle, no thanks. Yeah. And then there's this wild story. There's a website called Passing Through.com, more house sitters chronicling their experiences,

and they were in this crazy bushfire in Fiji. So they just got there, and all of a sudden there's this wildfire racing toward the property. And they're like, ah, and then even more intense, you should definitely read this story. I think the website's called Above Us Only Skies. They were in the middle of a category five hurricane, the biggest one on record of the Atlantic. And their story's crazy. So they just start out in the morning. They know the hurricane's coming, right?

Everybody knows. Everybody's been preparing. So, you know, they wake up in the morning, have their coffee. Okay, well, oh, skies are starting to get dark. okay well the hurricane's probably going to be about here I guess we better go inside and lock everything down and then they're just sitting there as the storm is like growing

and growing and now they can hear like things hitting the walls and now the mango tree is like in the pool and now a tree fell on the car and now the storm is like tearing at the doors to get in the house and all of a sudden these doors come flying open and they go rush to try and close them

and the guy gets his finger smashed like pretty much just right and so but like you can't get medical care in the middle of a storm so now they've got this drama with these doors and they realize they can't there's nothing they can do so they have to go essentially to a large bathroom right it's like the size of a closet they all get into this closet he's like got this smashed finger the storm is right outside the closet door water's coming in like waters may be getting into the electrical outlets because smoke's coming in there's just this raging their ears are popping because the pressure changes in the storm. And they literally don't know what's going

to happen with their lives. Oh, you should definitely read this story. It's so intense and crazy. Above us only skies. It sounds like they made it, thankfully. Yes, they lived to write about it and it's really incredible. And thank God that's never happened to me. Usually things go well. Sometimes you can have a horrible natural disaster. Yep, yep. Before I let you go, I would love to hear some of your other free accommodation tips. I know that you have also written about this on your blog as well. It sounds like you've done a little bit of everything. And so I already talked about the work exchanges earlier. That's my favorite. I want the entire world to work exchange. I'm constantly getting people to start hosting. I'm constantly convincing other travelers that it's the

best thing in the world. I feel like everybody knows about couch surfing, but maybe not. So couch surfing is this thing where if you're a host, you can say like, hey, I don't have much, but I have a couch to sleep on or you could if you have a guest bedroom cool like that's that happens too and then a traveler is like cool I don't I would love to sleep on your couch and then you just connect and I've couch surfed lots all over the world so that's a cool method language exchanges are really neat I haven't gotten one to fit into my calendar yet but essentially you're getting free accommodation and food in exchange for helping people learn a language better and it's usually inked And it's often like business people who need to practice their English for to be better in their jobs.

Now where would you find one of these? Because I do language exchanges all the time, but it was just like a mutual language, like a language exchange where we're doing Italian and English. And so there was never like it would never would have occurred to me to do like an accommodation thing. So how would you find? I know the one website that I know about for sure is DeVerbo. And then, you know, there's of course like hacking your, there's, there's lots of ways to. hack your housing like sleeping on an overnight bus or train sleeping at the airport um camping and then this is becoming super popular sleeping in your car but not just i mean people are living a whole lives now i feel like it used i've done this twice so i lived in a van in new zealand for a year and then in the back of a truck and the u.s for six months and i think you know like people who are spending money on housing and instead getting to spend their time and attention on the things that they really,

really care about. This is becoming a real, legit, genuine thing. Like, these aren't just like weirdos down by the river anymore. These are authors. I just interviewed for this project I'm working on Jimmy Buffett's tour writer. Like, he's a journalist and he lives out of a van. There's this baseball player, Daniel Norris, in the offseason, he lives out of a van. Like, this is a way to have control over your time and attention.

and more and more people want to do it. Like there's a woman who her goal is to inspire women to get out. And like I know this is something that you care about. Get out and do it. You know, like seize the day. She's actually about to, her name is case. She runs a website called Case of the Nomads. And she's doing a Kickstarter right now because she's biking 3,000 kilometers across New Zealand just to inspire other women to go.

I would love to talk to her. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah. I'll tell you all about her. But yeah, so anyway, this is becoming a real thing. Like getting control over your time and attention by not paying for a place to sleep. And people, it's becoming such a big deal that I actually, I realize that if you, the big barrier to entry, right, is getting your vehicle to live in, right? And you can try like Craigslist or Gumtree or Trade Me, but it's really difficult to dig through all of that stuff and find just the thing you're looking for.

So I got some of my tech genius friends to help fix this. and we're going to make a website called wanderlife.com was taken, so we have to, like, lose the M, WanderLife.co. Oh, I'm postcardacademy.com. Yeah, I saw that. Oddly, somebody has Postcardacademy.com, and it's a school, like a, I think, a children's school. I think it might, maybe it's not even anything. Whatever, it's taken.

But dot co is cool. Yes. Oh, it's totally cool. It's totally cool. So we're making this website called Wander Life, and we just put up the, like, front page so that you can go there and get told when it's going to be ready and maybe even be one of our beta testers because we want to have a map where you can just see vehicles to live in but then also or get the money's worth out of the van that you have because if you're selling your van like

Casey the woman who's going to New Zealand to do that big bike thing she her van's in Lincoln Nebraska and there aren't very many people in Lincoln Nebraska who are like oh cool you know what that's a great idea I totally want to have control over my time and attention by living in a van right like it's not so she doesn't have a place to tell people elsewhere who are totally ready that hey i've got this van and here it is and come get it and then like once you get it i talked to one woman this wolf biologist who lived in a prius and she got a lot of interesting information about like how to make a table that hangs from the hatchback and you know kind of like we want to create sort of like a Pinterest section but that's like very specific and that you could even look up

the make and model of your car and see exactly what other people have done with it down to like the measurements. And then one guy even wants us to have a dating site of like people who are into doing the wander life. So yeah. And this is like just for like van living. Yeah. I mean the word is van life.

But really like people live in trucks. They live in buses. They've converted old bread trucks. There are tiny houses. So anybody who's down to live the wander life can come to the wander life.com and you know, check it out and try and find the thing that works for them. Your website is called Half the Clothes. Yep.

So what should we be leaving at home if we're living this nomadic life? So I just want to point out, I'm glad that we're bringing this up in the context of minimalist packing, because that's where half the clothes came from. There's a quote that says, when you set out to travel, lay out all your things, and then take half the clothes and twice the money. And I don't know about the twice the money part, but the half the clothes part is really important. My number one packing advice to you is don't pack it. Like, stop looking at all these packing lists where the person's like, I have this really cool thing. And you should totally get it too because you shouldn't. Like, you're not going to start using things that you don't currently use.

You know, have you ever used a multi-tool in your life? Okay. And if you, if yes, when is the last time you used a multi-tool? And if you don't know what a multi-tool is, it's like a thing that turns into pliers. but also it's like Swiss Army knife but a little better you know so like you do you're probably not going to start using one you know things that's a global world you can get things that you think you might need later so if you're if you are not absolutely positive you're going to use something don't pack it you can get a multi tool in some random market in Thailand for like 20 cents and it'll be

the same one that you paid $40 for at the at the backpacking or the hardware store go on go on I'm really passionate about this I'm sorry yeah no it's true I I mean, it's like, think about what you're using every day. Are you wearing that entire closet of clothes that you've got? Are you wearing the same five things every day? Don't pack your whole closet. Right. So the only thing that I'm telling you, I really think you absolutely need,

but even people are doing without this passport. There's a woman, though, who's, like, gotten famous recently for, like, somehow she's been getting on flights without a passport. Yeah, right? Access to money, although I definitely know and meet people. people who travel with like almost nothing. So you kind of, I mean, most of us are going to want like our really comfortable piece of plastic that gives us cash out of ATMs. And then something to carry whatever items you have with you.

Not very many items, of course, right? You're not going to bring that much. So it doesn't need to be a big thing to carry the items. And then after that, I think nice things to have are other things to carry items. So I think it's great to be able to condense down really small. But then it's nice to have, and I go nylon on all these things. It's nice to have a nylon day bag, like a backpack that you can put stuff in and take it on a hike. And it doesn't have to be super comfortable because you're not hiking all the time.

But then it collapses down into just this tiny little thing. It's nice to be able to expand. If you're, you know, house sitting in Italy, it's nice to be able to have just a little nylon bag to go to the grocery store. So you have something to carry stuff in. That's true because they do charge for every bag. Yeah. And then when I'm transitioning between, like now is a perfect time. I usually just have a good 25 to 30 liter bag.

And I, right now, I have about double that. Most of it's food because I just left this house sit and that's one of those expenses that I was going to mention that house siters have. Like, you can't buy in bulk, you know, and then you end up with food waste and you can't really take it to the next place with you because, you know, refrigerators or whatever. So I do sometimes end up with almost as much carrying around as much food with me that I'm like going to eat soon as I have close. clothes and whatever else. Yeah, so something they eat on the train or whatever your transport is easy access. That's a very good idea. And then you don't have to have travel insurance.

I mean, when I was younger, I just went, that's so dumb. It's basically gambling. I'm not giving them my money. But after, like, busting my ankle, after jumping off the top of this jeep knee in the Philippines, and after bursting my eardrum, scuba diving. And recently, I just cracked a tooth. That sucked. Thank goodness I had travel insurance and was able to go to the dentist.

Was that in the U.S.? Yeah. I was about to climb Mount Washington in New Hampshire. Literally 24 hours before departure, I'm eating these crackers. Oh, God, I feel like I'm getting old now. Like, who cracks teeth? And it just really, there was a loud noise in my mouth and it really hurt. And I couldn't believe it.

Like a chunk of my tooth had literally cracked off. And now I'm supposed to be out in the wilderness for three days in a row climbing the mountain that like the day before that was the coldest place on earth. That's cool that travel insurance picked that up. To be honest, I'm surprised. Could you share which policy you generally use? When I'm doing shorter trips, I tend to go through this website called insuremytrip.com. They are great if you're going on trips for less than 90 days because you've got to be really careful.

Insurance companies, they don't like the unpredictability generally. So like most insurance companies, you need to buy the policy before you go and it can't be longer than 90 days because that's just too much risk for them. So when I'm doing a shorter trip, I get a policy through insure my trip. When I'm doing a longer trip or like I knew I was mountaineering, I knew I was climbing a mountain and I knew like that something could happen to me and that I would want good insurance. So world nomads, they're pretty well known. And that's who I use most of the time for any longer trips longer than 90 days and anything like I'm climbing a mountain. So I had gotten a policy with them, and I don't want to say I'm still waiting for the check to come. But I've made travel.

I've never not had a travel claim get paid. So if that happened to me, I would be so incredibly surprised. And then as far as long term, do you just, I think my mom, I can hear her in the background of me saying, like, find out more about the health insurance. In general, if you plan on being in the U.S. for a long time. Do you ever do any sort of annual thing? Because I was taking a look at how expensive health care was in the U.S. if you were like a solopreneur. And it was crazy.

Like, I couldn't afford it. Well, I feel like that's one benefit of being a nomad. So to qualify for a travel insurance policy, you have to be 100 miles from home. And my home, technically, like where I vote and like resident, I'm Wyoming. Or not Wyoming. That's where I'm from. Arizona, where my parents live, is technically my home. And I do spend, I mean, I go and see my parents and, like, I get my mail there.

And, you know, for all intents and purposes, it's my home. But, like, I'm almost always 100 miles from that home, you know. So I actually, for a long time, said that. I was just telling people, oh, yeah, and this risk I have in my life is I don't have health insurance because it's so expensive in America. And then one night I thought I was, like, maybe getting appendicitis. I have a secret fear of parents. is going to blow up someday.

I don't think that's irrational because when I'm home, yeah, it's like it is something where you feel like a little pain and normally you wouldn't care. And then you're like, oh my God, no, I'm in America. What am I going to do? It's going to describe me. Yes. Okay. So I was like, Gemma, how expensive is this insurance that you keep just saying it's so expensive

I can't afford it? Like, can you? Wait a minute. can you afford it? So I checked and I was so embarrassed. A travel policy for what I was doing at the time was $80 a month. Like, I'm an idiot. It was not unaffordable expensive. I'm so dumb. And even the one that I just got to climb Mount Washington, it's $100 a month. Compared to what my American friends are paying. Yeah. That's much better. That's so affordable. Much better. My mom is going to be so happy. I'll just tell her all of these different policies that I can use.

But Gemma, thank you so much for chatting to me today. You gave such great advice. Where can people find out more about you? Thanks for having me. This has been really, really fun to talk to you. Okay, so let's see. Where can people? Well, half theclothes.com, that's kind of my home on the interweb.

and then I'm starting with one of my readers from that website she and I are starting that ticket to blog podcast so that's ticket the number two ticket to blog and that wanderlife.com I'm sure that my voice and opinions will pop up there a little bit. Is that answer your question? Where to find me online? Yeah. Do you want people to follow you on social media at all? Oh, yeah. I mean you can. Like, I'm sure I'll put on my half the close Facebook that I am on this awesome podcast

and you should listen if you want to learn about these things. And I'm on Twitter and I just started an Instagram account last night. So. Welcome. Yeah. Come hang out. I mean, but like, I kind of have an awkward relationship with social media. Like, I don't, I really want people to use their time and attention on the things that

are most important to them. So I'm kind of hesitant to be like, go get on social media right now and follow me. I don't want your time and attention. I want you to spend it on the things that there's a quote that I really like. It's don't ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and then go out and do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive. Brilliant.

That's a beautiful way to end. Yeah. So don't come follow me on social media. Go come alive. And I mean, sure. Like if you want to see the inspirational, if you want me to see, like I'm going to post that quote on my social media. If you want that in your life, then good. But like, mostly just becoming alive and not on social media with me, hey? That sounds great. Thanks again, Jemma. Yeah, thank you very

much. By next week's episode, I will probably be living in a van down by the river somewhere. And if you got that Chris Farley reference, then I love you. Okay, for highlights from today's discussion, visit postcardacademy.com. Tread my article, Women don't need to be in crisis to travel. Head to Medium's website. On next week's episode, I will be talking to artist Eric Wall about his expat life in Sweden and all the reasons why you should visit Stockholm this year. That's all for now. Thanks for listening and have a beautiful week wherever you are. Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free conversation sheet sheet with simple formulas that you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you're in a meeting or

just talking with friends. Download it at sarah micotel.com slash blink no more.