Business Travel - Day 4 of 10

This is my last night in this fancy hotel. What I wanted to point out is that each room has a computer -- I didn't use this one since I have my own, but it's basically a keyboard and a screen. Still pretty amazing that this is the state of our dependence on computers, that now one comes with your room.

Jeff Skiles, the USAirways co-pilot and today's luncheon speaker, was really good. Even though you know he's told the story 1000 times, it didn't have that overly-told story feel to it. He told the story from beginning to end, second by second, and I commented as if I felt that I was getting a real insider look at the incident. He also had photos and then played the whole 3 minutes of Air Traffic Control tapes which were quite interesting to hear.

Tonight the woman I report to here took a bunch of us out to dinner. Turned out to be an Italian buffet. I can't say I'm a fan of buffets -- I think, especially after a long day at work, I want to sit and be waited on. We were sitting in this "open air" restaurant -- and I put open air in quotation marks because it's in the biosphere part of this place and it's a strange experience since you feel as if you are outside but you're not.

So tomorrow (Saturday)I work for a half day here, then pick up a rental car here and go on to hotel #2 which will not be as nice as this one. Bid $72 a night for it on Priceline. Started at $60, got turned down, went to $65, got turned down, went to
$70, got turned down but I knew I was getting close so I went to $72 and got accepted. It's a Holiday Inn.

Business Travel - Day 3 of 10

So here's the bed -- actually one of two in the room. If you look at the height of the nightstand, you can see how high it is. In fact, when I sit on the edge of the bed, my feet don't touch the floor.

The bedspread is weird -- sort of Puss n Boots style clothes on monkeys -- in a Pirate/palm tree background. I say pirates, but there are no ships, just swords and swashbuckling monkeys.

Nothing much to report for today. There was a media lunch in the press room today and that went well. I was supposed to work until 5 and close the room, but I ended up talking to some people so we didn't leave until 6. I was hoping to get other work done during the day, but that hasn't happened so maybe I'll get some other stuff done tonight.

The highlight of tomorrow is the association's main luncheon where the speaker is Jeff Skiles who was the copilot aboard the USAirways flight that landed on the Hudson River. I asked someone today what his message was -- now that he's doing the convention circuit and this fellow who had heard him speak says he is really funny so it's a message of optimism which sounds good. More on that tomorrow.

Last year, I had met Captain Sullenberger -- well, I was talking to someone well known in aviation and he came over to meet the person who I was talking to and so I got introduced as a courtesy. Very low key guy. Really a lovely man.

I started my day with someone holding the elevator for me and I thanked him and he said to me, "You don't remember me, Pat, do you?" and I looked at him and said "No." And he said "It's Willy from Thunder Bay" and that didn't mean a thing to me, but I lied and said 'Oh of course" as if I had made the connection and then he kissed me and I still have no idea who he is. Maybe he haunts convention hotels, reads women's name badges (which I was wearing) and kisses them...

Business Travel - Day Two

Let's talk about hotel amenities. I like the ones here. I think because it's a convention center where people are likely to stay two or three nights that you get bigger bottles.

So here you get the typical shampoo, conditioner and body lotion. I don't like combined shampoo/conditioner as some hotels try to foist off on you -- I feel that when it's combined, it can't do a good job on either cleaning or conditioning.

You can see how much shampoo I used -- and it's great not to be forced to squeeze every last drop out of the bottle and hope they leave you more. I also like the bigger bars of soap. Who's old enough to remember when motels had their own little bars of soap with the hotel names on them? [Just checked ebay and sure enough, one little bar from the Deauville Hotel in Atlantic City is selling for $10.]

And, yes, I do take the leftover home with me. Old habit. If I get room service, I also take the little jars of jelly home with me because it's good stuff. Not so with the ketchup. Sometimes with the mustard.

Today was fine. A fairly new hire at one of my clients -- someone who I talked to on the phone daily but never met in person -- well, we met today and she said she had a present for me. I did not take it literally -- thought she was going to dump work on me, but it was a present and it turned out to be this very pretty little metal bookmark. I am always so sincerely grateful for a little gift like that -- it's so lovely to think that someone made that effort.

Now back in my room, someone kept knocking on the door, and I kept ignoring it until it was clear the person was not going away. Well, it was a waiter with a plate of chocolate covered strawberries that came with this very nice note from the association people -- the people I'm working for this week, thanking me for my work on their behalf.

Living alone and working alone, I have to say I love being spoiled like this.

Business Travel -- Day 1 of 10

Today was a travel day for a long trip to Florida of two trade shows back to back. Took a flight this afternoon which was totally uneventful, other than its arriving 30 minutes early. I had taken this same flight in February -- gets to Orlando at 5:30 which I thought was a good arrival in order to have dinner and a relaxing evening before work, and in February my flight was five hours late.

Well, today I was lucky and I don't think it struck me until I was getting in a cab to go to my hotel that I am on time, I will have a nice dinner, I will relax in my room tonight -- just as planned.

This first convention is an association for companies that manufacture navigation and communication electronics for airplanes -- also a relatively new componenent of Internet, passenger entertainment systems, etc. One segment is the manufacturers and the other segment is the technicians and shops that install and repair the equipment. This is for everything from airliners down to little airplanes.

I write for this association's magazine and since I know most of the aviation media who will be there, my job here is to work the press room. I call myself "press room matron." At conventions like this, the media get their own room to work with computers, refreshments, places to interview people and I make sure it all runs smoothly.

Luckily I just have to show up, not set up, so I start bright and early at 7:30 tomorrow morning. At least there will be coffee ready.

This hotel/convention center is called the Gaylord Palms, in Kissimmee, and it's one of those -- oh heck, what was that name of that self-contained world.. the Biosphere? So it's all enclosed around this atrium where everything is fake -- fake waterfalls, fake foliage (well most of it), fake flowers, fake little village with real little stores, fake rocks, etc. The photo is the view from my balcony overlooking this atrium.

I have been in literally hundreds of hotel rooms in my business travel, and I've often looked around wondering at the sameness of it and what I would do differently. Today, I experienced one amenity which I loved, and didn't even know it was possible. I passed the Coke machine ... oh excuse me, the "vending room" and you could use your room key (like a credit card) to get a Coke.

I arrived parched and was able to swipe my room key for a nice big bottle of water and then a bottle of Diet Coke. Very convenient.

I must say that I arrived in a pissy mood, just on general principals, but the service, the food, my room are all quite good. Since my room is provided by the association who is hosting this convention, I was told when I checked in that I was in the best part of the hotel. So I am feeling like quite the VIP.

Easter Sunday

One of the great pleasures of city life is sitting in an open air restaurant and watching the world go by as you eat. Samalita's is at my corner, on First Avenue, and it bills itself as California Mexican, but it's really an eclectic menu.

My favorite thing on the menu is crabmeat guacamole which the server makes tableside. I don't think I've ever seen it anywhere else -- but if you like regular guacamole and like crabmeat, you'll love this combination.

I was hunting for a book earlier (which I couldn't find -- perhaps I loaned it out) in order to include an Easter message. I had seen Peter Gomes, who had been (and maybe still is) a chaplain at Harvard, on television and I was so impressed and intrigued by his spirituality that I bought a book of his sermons, which is an unlikely purchase for me as a lapsed church-goer.

Anyway, the Easter sermon in this book was about fear. He used the traditional story of Easter morning and pointed out that off all the things Jesus could have said to the women who first saw him alive again... On this momentous occasion that would influence the world for centuries to come, Gomes points out that the first words out of Jesus' mouth were, "Do not be afraid" and Gomes said that's the message we should take from Easter.

On New Age fronts, Louise Hay always says, "Stop scaring yourself" and boy, I'm good at that! I can easily conjure up the worst possible outcomes, the worst possible explanations,and the worst possible events. I am able to stop myself after a few seconds (ok, maybe after a minute or two) and realize that I wouldn't allow anyone around me to be this negative. Fear is really crippling so that's the message this lapsed Christian semi-New Age person is going to have for myself and pass along to you this Easter: Do not be afraid.

Word Play

I am somewhat known among my colleagues as a grammar/usage freak -- maybe that means I'm of an age where the rules of grammar were still drilled into our young heads way back when.

Anyway, a colleague wrote me stumped by the use of the word myriad. He wanted to know which was corrrect: a myriad of options or myriad options.

Hmmmmm... I went to dictionary.com and saw the myriad can be used as both an adjective and a noun, so either was right.

What I learned is that the root of myriad is from the Greek word myrias which means "ten thousand."

I emailed him back with my ruling to which he replied that he guesses myriad is like the F-word -- how you can use it all different ways!

Early Spring on East 87th Street - Part 2

Funny all the things one photo can show. I took this picture originally just to show the trees blooming one block over from me. This block is 87th between First Avenue and York Avenue, but I see more in this photo to talk about.

First, and I noticed this when I took the photo, is that you can see birds in that first tree which are pigeons, and I don't think you normally see, nor do I know if I ever have seen, pigeons roosting in trees. They are more building/statue kind of birds.

Second I notice a payphone, which is a rare thing to see in the City these days. Used to be there was one on every block -- even a little booth with a door that closed which now seems as quaint as a horse and buggy. I don't remember the last time I used a pay phone -- I don't even know if it's a quarter to make a call.

Next, you can see that in the right hand side, I caught a bit of a building which is an ice cream store. Have to admit that I was happy when I heard an ice cream store was going in on my corner, but I don't like the place, I don't like their ice cream, I don't like the people who work there and so in the three or so years it's been on this corner (it was previously a manicure place and before that a fish market), I think I've gone there three times.

The last thing I noticed, which I hadn't noticed before is the building poster on the left hand side for bed bugs. I had pitched a bed bug story to a magazine I no longer work for five years ago, then again four years ago, and one last time three years ago. Each time, the thinking was it was too rare of a problem to write about, but I knew that wasn't the case.

In fact, a friend of mine who lives in a luxury high rise building had a bed bug epidemic in her building where the building management brought in a bed bug sniffing dog to check all the apartments. Luckily hers was (and remains)bed bug free. When I noticed that poster, I thought of it as vindication for my article idea which should not have been rejected.

I had really followed the bed bug situation from its happening in foreign hotels, to crummy US hotels, to good US hotels, to regular people, to someone who I met but was not a friend, and then to a friend. It's like the circle got smaller and smaller. I do remember my mother saying "Sleep tight; don't let the bed bugs bite" but I never thought they were real things!