Jan
4
January 4, 2007
I’ve bitched before about the poor timing of Macworld, but this year it seems especially unfair to be swamped with tradeshow preparations on a week I would just like to relax and unwind from the travel and chaos of Christmas.
The last few days leading up to the show are always insane as I frantically scurry around looking for boxes and scheduling FedEx pickups and packing up massive piles of ethernet cable and freaking the hell out for the millionth time as I realize I totally forgot about whatever mission-critical thing I forgot about. I have an enormous checklist (brochures, CDs, license key stickers, manuals, ballpoint pens, t-shirts, pricing sheets, energy bars, credit card slips, oh my god the list goes on and on and on) but it’s inevitable I will manage to space out on at least one important detail that I’ll probably remember around 3 AM Monday morning.
Tradeshows are unbelievably expensive. This year I had a custom booth built for Workplace, and it cost, oh, about a fucking hojillion dollars. That’s just for the structure–the exposition services like labor, shipping, electrical, internet, and furniture cost another arm and a leg. Assuming we are talking about diamond-plated appendages lined with pure heroin, that is.
In the past, we have paid for the use of a trashcan in our booth space. I believe it cost something like $100 per day, and it was literally a piece of cardboard folded into a sort of cube and taped shut. Having it emptied at the end of each day cost extra.
We should all go into the exposition business, is what I’m saying. All we’ll need is a team of cardboard-folders, and we’ll be rich. Rich, I say! Of course, our souls will be black and dead inside, but hey.
I have one more scrambling workday to get the last-minute crap taken care of, then I fly to San Francisco on Monday at the unbelievable departure hour of 7 AM. I believe that entails getting ready and leaving the house around 5, which makes me cry a little painful tear every time I think about it.
Almost every tradeshow I’ve ever gone to has prominently featured the festive morale-building activity of getting shitfaced drunk each night with my coworkers. I remember one show several years back when a bunch of us stopped by a coworker’s hotel room to pick him up in the morning, and there was a folded-up towel in front of the toilet with two knee-shaped dents in it from the night before. “Tradeshow badge of honor,” the guy said, grinning and shrugging.
This time I’ll be sober as a goddamn owl. I won’t lie, I kind of miss the days when “I love you, man” was a totally acceptable thing to slobber around 1:30 in the morning when everyone had blown their per diem on rum-and-cokes; when we were all in a new city together, trading war stories and gossip and feeling like kids on a field trip.
Then again, there is nothing quite on this earth like standing in the booth the next day, your mouth feeling as though you had chewed fifteen dead mice for breakfast and your head throbbing in time to the obnoxious music the booth next to you keeps playing over. And over. AND OVER. And you know that you’ve got the whole hellish day stretching in front of you, you have to smile and talk to people, and you probably should try not to throw up on anyone’s shoes.
I will say this about my personal take on sobriety: among other benefits, a life without hangovers is a vast improvement.
Every time I think about the fact that I’m going to be away from Riley for a whole week, my brain sort of skitters off to the side. Jesus, I’m going to miss him.
I changed my return flight and instead of coming home I’ll go directly to Eugene to meet up with JB before heading on to Coos Bay. His grandmother died today (it’s okay, it was mostly definitely her time to go and it was relatively peaceful) and the service is Saturday the 13th. JB gets to drive Riley down there by himself, which should be…interesting.
Anyway, it’s been a busy-ass week and I have exactly zero plans for the weekend. JB’s brother is coming to town and the two guys are going to the Seahawks game on Saturday (because all of a sudden, out of nowhere, JB has been into football lately. He claims it’s so he can watch games with Riley, but uhhh Riley isn’t really into much TV-wise unless Elmo is up there talking about how Mr. Noodle needs to wash his hands, wash your hands Mr. Noodle, you know, your hands, they are at the ends of your arms! — which oh jesus someone just give Mr. Fucking Noodle some antibacterial gel already) and I believe I will spend my time trying to find one single solitary outfit that is appropriate for a funeral service. Are my black Old Navy slouchy pants no good? Probably not.
So, tell me. What are you doing this weekend? (I LOVE THIS PART.)
Jan
3
Some family-related things:
1) My grandfather invented a type of trailer hitch back in 1946 and called it the “Draw-Tite”. He founded a company that, while no longer in the family, is still around today and apparently doing quite well. The next time you’re driving around and happen to see a Draw-Tite trailer hitch on the car in front of you, you can think to yourself, “Hey! That was invented by the beloved grandpa of that random girl whose blog I sometimes read!”.
2) My aunt Linda (I was named after her, but she got the cooler-sounding middle name, while my own name is LINDA LEE, thankyouverymuch) has started her own blog. You should read it, because she is funny and smart and awesome (and if there are glitches in the website, it is totally my fault). I’m hoping the pressure is on my mom to start one too, because she is also funny and smart and awesome, and the family that blogs together…uh, probably tends to say embarrassing things about each other on the internet. So stay tuned!
My aunt and mom live together in Port Angeles, along with my mom’s Significant Other, John. They recently added a parrot to their household, which is…well, it’s weird, because birds are weird and twitchy and they freak my shit with their explosive wing-kerfuffling, but he’s very pretty. See?
Except for his freaky little feet. Gah, the feet.
Riley was fairly excited about the bird’s presence last weekend, which was highly entertaining.
I love this picture, because he’s all, “Dude, I thought I was supposed to be on bear patrol! WTF IS THAT?”
Anyway, onto other stuff. Like this:
It’s kind of a long story, but this picture got sent to a staff email distribution at Workplace today. Yes. I am a highly professional, well-respected employee. With Diet Coke protruding from my nose.
This is what happens when your co-workers have access to your Flickr account, friends. Let me act as a warning to you all.
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