Travel Happenings – Because I was an idiot and opened my mouth a couple of months ago, I ended up facilitating a two-day meeting for my counterparts from across the nation. However, since this meeting was going to be held at an office in Tampa, The Wife and I decided it would be better to get a hotel for a couple of nights. One, that avoided the hour long commute both ways and it would give me the freedom to socialize with my peers outside of working hours. Yeah, let’s just say things did not go according to plan.

I thought I was booking one of the newer hotels near the office. How many times would you expect to have two hotels of the same chain next door to each other? If you guessed that Derek did not get the new hotel and instead booked the run-down hotel of the same chain next door, you guessed correctly. It wasn’t the worst hotel we’ve stayed at, but you could see the bottom of the list. It was bad enough that we changed our plans and checked out a day early.

The meeting went well, but there were overriding concerns. Please see Monday’s post. I also didn’t socialize much after working hours because my counterparts all seem to be raging extroverted night owls who think nothing of staying out late. The Wife and I are very much early-to-bed-early-to-rise folks.

Still, the meeting was an overall success, and I did enjoy chatting with my counterparts. It was also somewhat gratifying when one of my counterparts who I respect specifically pointed myself out as one of the most knowledgeable about our program.

The cats were less than pleased with all of the travel in a short amount of time.

Yarn Happenings – As I’m sure most of you are aware, the craft store Joann’s is going out of business. On a lark, I brought up their website on my laptop Sunday morning. This ended up with a significant yarn purchase. At Ward Manor, yarn is a non-perishable consumable. It won’t go bad, and The Wife and MIL have plenty of use for it.

Gadget Happenings – Upon the urging of The Wife, we picked up this intriguing charger for AA batteries from Olight. I was reluctant because of cost, location, and it only handled AA batteries. Well, it’s kinda neat. I like when it drops the charged batteries down. Kind of reminds me of a pachinko machine.