Whooooooo Phillies

Ok. It's been a busy week since we got back from the Lake on Sunday. First off, I caught a cold on Friday, was a wreck on Saturday, had the cold move into my chest on Sunday, hacking up phlegm as we drove home.... Good times, good times. I suffered through work Monday (had to get caught up on some things) and hopped a plane to BILLINGS again that night.

Had a big presentation at 9am Tuesday in Billings, and caught the 1pm flight home. Wednesday AM I flew to Philly. Ah Philadelphia.

I was with Mike (my boss) and Katie (our marketing sassafrass), and the goal was a "VIP Event". But first lunch at Reading Station (again - I can't stay away from that place, and I haven't eaten the same place twice). This time, my meal was a pastrami sandwich with huge chunks of meat which they trimmed lean while I watched, with some slaw and russian dressing on rye bread that somehow kept it all together by being denser than shale. It was amazing to eat. I had a bowl of chicken matzo ball soup too, which was the best I'd had since Zaroff's passed away.

On to the VIP... but first a detour to the Philly Airport Marriott - Expensive, surprisingly inconvenient given its location, and not all that nice, with some VERY surly or inept help. Good times. We had dropped in prior to the Reading Feast and checked our bags since the rooms weren't ready.... and to get them back took over 15 minutes of them LOOKING for them in various rooms. Wow.

Ok, the VIP event was the Phillies versus the Washington Generals^h^h^h^h^h^h^h Senators (sorry - double old school joke: The generals are the patsy team that loses against the Harlem Globetrotters in every game, which was a comment on how badly they were pasted last night... and the ^h is very old - if you didn't have your keyboard configured correctly and tried to use the backspace key on an old UnIX system, it would display ^h instead of removing your typing. So double the geekiness for all of you).

We had people from three prospective clients there, and we provided food and drink and some great seats in a skybox in the new Citizens Bank Park - a really wonderful stadium actually. I was introduced to philly's own "Water Ice" frozen treat: Basically a hard mister misty in a minicup. Water Ice. Wow. Anyway, the schmooze is the word at these events, but I took the low key approach, which I think is the better option anyway. Of course the team won, which always helps things.

Came home this morning on the early flight, spent the late morning with the family, then took Pamela to the airport: Yes, she's doing a ladies' weekend out: VEGAS BABY with 5 Moms from Bella's pre-kindergarten class. I already to a report - they were seated on a party plane in the midst of 16 young men on their way for a bachelor party. There were a lot of "whoooops" and high fives. (This doesn't happen in first class on the way to Billings, by the way)

Isaac caught my cold, and has been walking around with a stuffy nose, adorably "daying dings wid a duffy doze" - now that he's talking a lot, it's maybe the cutest thing I've ever heard, even though I feel very sad for him. He's getting his energy back, however: As I sat on the floor watching Mister Rogers with him tonight, he climbed up onto the couch and stage dove right onto my belly.

He continues his "eating more" path which is heartening: Tonight he attacked a bag of "Cheetos Natural", and when I tried to grab a few he actually swatted my hand away yelling "NO DADDY! MY CHIPS!!!!" If only I could get that with broccoli. For my dinner I had a BLT made with fresh tomatoes from our victory garden: Huge, fresh, delicious. I will never even LOOK at a hothouse "Tomato". Forget it. NO WAY.

So that's the quick update. Life continues to speed by at an unreasonable pace, but it's all wonderful.