Is it weird?

When our cats sneeze, I say, "Bless you."

Is that strange?

Charleston Recap and the Tulip Festival

Charleston is a really neat city. The conference hotel was downtown within walking distance of tons of stuff. The weather was fabulous except for a little bit of rain on the last day after the conference ended. That didn't stop us from walking around for 3 hours though! One night we went out for dinner with a bunch of the conference participants at Muse. The food was WONDERFUL. After that, a few of us went to a rooftop bar for a drink. Then I went back to my room because I was pooped. Overall, it was a great time. More pictures are posted here.

Yesterday, Marc and I went to the Tulip Festival in Woodburn. I have never in my life seen so many tulips. It was really amazing! You can check out some more pictures here.

Home Again

I got up at 4:00 a.m. Eastern time today--after my alarm went off for 6 minutes without me hearing it--to get back to the Charleston airport and come home. Yeah, that's 1:00 a.m. Pacific time. Which means I'm tired. I'm sure I'll sleep well tonight!

Packing up again

After a couple days at home, I'm preparing to take off again--this time for Charleston, SC. I did laundry yesterday and started making a mental list of all the things I need to do and pack. This morning, Marc is making me breakfast (he's so sweet!). I'm going to attempt to go to bed early tonight since I need to get up around 3 a.m. but considering that I slept in this morning, it'll probably be hard. The drive to the airport could end up being quite interesting if we get the snow and freezing temps that they're predicting. Yuck.

At least I'll get another Mexican Hot Chocolate. :)

L.A.

L.A..... ahhhh... I'm at LAX now, waiting to leave. It ended up being an interesting trip. The class we went to was really good. Fabulous instructor. After Tuesday's unadventurous dinner at the hotel restaurant, we decided on Wednesday to cab it to Hermosa Beach for dinner. We walked out on the pier, then ate at a Mexican joint. Then... back at the hotel that night, I got sick. And I woke up in the middle of the night to get sick again. Boooo! Thursday morning, when I stood up, I wasn't sure how I was going to make it through the day. Achy all over. The thought of food make me feel ill. But I struggled through it and managed to pay attention during class. By the afternoon I was able to stomach a slice of watermelon, some Ritz crackers, and Excedrin. I'm better today, but I still don't have an appetite.

So I'm standing at a little power station kiosk thingy where you can plug in your electronics. There's a girl sitting in a chair by the thing with her laptop plugged in and sitting on the little shelf. Another lady came up a few minutes ago and plugged in her laptop and then went and sat down about 30 feet away. About 5 mintues later, some random couple approached her laptop, opened it, and started trying to use it. I looked at the people, then looked down the row of seats to the lady, and then asked if that was theirs (knowing full well that it wasn't). The lady comes up, and the guy says something like, "Oh, I just thought those were here for anyone to use." Uhhhh, really? Because it makes sense for random laptops to just be sitting around LAX for anyone to use? Okay. Weird people.

P.S.

It's really smoggy here. When we were flying south and I was looking out to the east, I couldn't see a thing past the end of the wing. Seriously--completely smoggy. My eyes are already burning. Bah!

Made it to L.A.

I wrote this on the plane this afternoon:

I have a love-hate relationship with traveling. On one hand, I love going places and experiencing different things. I also love the hustle and bustle of airports with so many people going so many different places for so many different reasons. The excitement of simply breaking my everyday routine and going someplace different is palpable enough to give me chills when I think about it.

On the other hand, I hate the hassle that goes with traveling. I hate figuring out what to pack and trying not to overpack. I hate the drive to the airport, the parking, the shuttles, and the waiting for flights to board and then take off.

The plane I'm on right now, headed to Los Angeles, is close to being full. There are a few babies crying, but I can't hear them now that I have my headphones on and iPod playing. There's a mom with her two kids sitting in the row behind me. From what I gathered listening to their conversation before and as we took off, the kids may have only been on a plane once before, and it sounds like it was a small one nothing like the 737 we're on now. Their excitement over tiny things like getting pushed back from the gate grew to an almost overwhelming exhilaration as we turned onto the runway and sped up to take off. Their entire conversation was littered with "Oh my gosh!" and "Holy crud!" Ah, the simple life of children. Sometimes I think we all need to take a lesson from kids about how not to take things for granted—things that used to be so full of wonder for us.

Like flying on a plane. It really is pretty amazing when you think about it. Our ability to fly anywhere in the world in a matter of hours (sometimes very long hours… but still…) is pretty incredible. I'm grateful for any opportunity to travel anywhere, regardless of the hassle that comes with it.

Plus, my belly is full of a Mexican hot chocolate right now. I can't complain about anything.

Travels

I'm off to L.A. tomorrow with my boss for a training course. I'll be there through Friday night.

The best part: Getting a Mexican Hot Chocolate from Coffee People at the airport! Woot!

Yes, I am the big big slacker

Last Friday we went back to the Jester Comedy Club. I think the consensus was that it wasn't as funny as the first show we went to a couple months ago, but it was still a good time. Possibly the best part was watching Kristin turn nearly purple when one of the comedians picked on her a bit.

Last Saturday was a big lounge around the house all day and night kinda day. We played a bit of Rock Band. Good times.

Work was pretty busy this past week, and it really hit home that I'm about to be out of the office for quite a while. Last Tuesday I took a sick day for the first time in almost exactly a year. I just felt icky, dizzy, and sick to my stomach. After a lot of sleep, I felt better.

Last night we did happy hour at Bugatti's, then Rey and Greg and later Amber came over to play Rock Band. More good times!

Today we went to Mactarnahan's Tap Room for lunch with Chris and Slimey. We ran a bunch of errands. Steve agreed to buy our old TV, and he and Andrea invited us over for dinner, so Marc and I loaded the TV into the truck--which was interesting in a bad way when we both just about crushed our fingers off. But we survived. Dinner was great, but we pooped out pretty quickly and headed home around 10:00.

I'm working most of the day on Monday until I have to cheat on my hairdresser and get my cut, color, and highlight done by someone else. Then I have a meeting I have to go in for on Tuesday morning. Tuesday afternoon my boss and I fly out for L.A. I'll be back from there late Friday night. Then at 6:00 a.m. the following Monday, I'll be back on a plane on my way to Charleston, South Carolina, for a conference. It should be a good networking opportunity. I was supposed to come back late Wednesday, but now I'm staying another night and flying back into town around noon on Thursday.

I dread having to pack for these trips, but I'm looking forward to the travel.

I'm a cheater

I'm cheating.... on my hairdresser. Brooke's been doing my hair every 4 weeks for the past year and a half. But with my trips to L.A. and Charleston coming up right when my next appointment should happen and Brooke being booked up on the days I am in town, I had to schedule with someone else. Boooooooooo. Is it weird that I feel guilty about this?