(no subject)
Back from Orlando. It was a good week, with lots of good people. Got a few good leads on possible jobs. I cultivated my reputation as a pool shark. And I got gifted with my very own pair of travel chopsticks, from pagany_guy and glenmarshall, and christened them with a very nice sushi meal at Ran Getsu. Note to self: the addition of thin slices of kobe beef to a california roll makes for a very heavenly piece of sushi.
The other really excellent meal was at the Mikado Teppan House at the Marriott resort I stayed at with Slaven the last conference I was at in Orlando, with gilamonstre and Manuel. It was a bit of a farce actually getting there, due mostly to my failure to read the scale on the map, but we got there in the end, and I definitely enjoyed my filet mignon even more after a long hike.
The final highlight of the week was seeing the Cirque du Soliel performance of La Nouba at Downtown Disney. The addition of BMX bikes, while really impressive, didn't quite fit in with the Cirque aesthetic, but the performances were really good, and the ribbon dancers were out of this world. I wouldn't have thought of doing that myself, so many thanks go to John Moerke for putting the idea in our heads and getting us organized to go. I enjoyed it immensely.
In and amongst all of that, some real, actual, useful work got done, too. We got some clarity around our project, aired out some disagreements, and I think things will be smoother now. I also got an introduction to another SOA project I think I may be able to provide some help to.
But, it was exhausting. It's a curse, being an introvert that loves people. When someone asks me to join them for a drink/dinner/show/anything, I almost always say sure. And it does seem like a good idea at the time, and I do have fun. But with all day meetings and then all night socializing and no time to recharge, I end up drained and exhausted. I'm spending the entire weekend on my couch, recuperating. I really need to adjust how I handle these weeks. Try and force myself to take a break from the socialization part early in the week, before it gets to be too much, so I'm not so completely antisocial by the end of it. The afternoon I spent relaxing by the pool on Wednesday with gilamonstre helped a lot, but I need to remember to do more of that kind of thing, preferably before I really need it.
Of course because I was feeling antisocial, the lady I was sitting next to on the plane home last night was flying back to Toronto to see her dying father and *really* wanted someone to talk to. I spent the whole trip talking aimlessly with her, trying to distract her. Did a fairly good job, I think, of keeping her calm. Until we actually landed and she got a message from the airline telling her that her luggage had been left in Orlando. Which meant she had no medications and, even worse for last night, no winter clothes. Apparently she never learned the first rule of travel: have everything you absolutely need to have in carry on.
But the flight was only one hour late, my home wasn't one of the many in Toronto that had no power, and our new DVD player had arrived while I was away. Friday night curled up with some chinese food, a beer and a movie was pretty much the perfect end to the week.
The other really excellent meal was at the Mikado Teppan House at the Marriott resort I stayed at with Slaven the last conference I was at in Orlando, with gilamonstre and Manuel. It was a bit of a farce actually getting there, due mostly to my failure to read the scale on the map, but we got there in the end, and I definitely enjoyed my filet mignon even more after a long hike.
The final highlight of the week was seeing the Cirque du Soliel performance of La Nouba at Downtown Disney. The addition of BMX bikes, while really impressive, didn't quite fit in with the Cirque aesthetic, but the performances were really good, and the ribbon dancers were out of this world. I wouldn't have thought of doing that myself, so many thanks go to John Moerke for putting the idea in our heads and getting us organized to go. I enjoyed it immensely.
In and amongst all of that, some real, actual, useful work got done, too. We got some clarity around our project, aired out some disagreements, and I think things will be smoother now. I also got an introduction to another SOA project I think I may be able to provide some help to.
But, it was exhausting. It's a curse, being an introvert that loves people. When someone asks me to join them for a drink/dinner/show/anything, I almost always say sure. And it does seem like a good idea at the time, and I do have fun. But with all day meetings and then all night socializing and no time to recharge, I end up drained and exhausted. I'm spending the entire weekend on my couch, recuperating. I really need to adjust how I handle these weeks. Try and force myself to take a break from the socialization part early in the week, before it gets to be too much, so I'm not so completely antisocial by the end of it. The afternoon I spent relaxing by the pool on Wednesday with gilamonstre helped a lot, but I need to remember to do more of that kind of thing, preferably before I really need it.
Of course because I was feeling antisocial, the lady I was sitting next to on the plane home last night was flying back to Toronto to see her dying father and *really* wanted someone to talk to. I spent the whole trip talking aimlessly with her, trying to distract her. Did a fairly good job, I think, of keeping her calm. Until we actually landed and she got a message from the airline telling her that her luggage had been left in Orlando. Which meant she had no medications and, even worse for last night, no winter clothes. Apparently she never learned the first rule of travel: have everything you absolutely need to have in carry on.
But the flight was only one hour late, my home wasn't one of the many in Toronto that had no power, and our new DVD player had arrived while I was away. Friday night curled up with some chinese food, a beer and a movie was pretty much the perfect end to the week.