Sunday, October 05, 2008

Home sweet home

We had a wonderful time up in Sault Ste. Marie. Paul and I took off on Wednesday morning for the way north, so that I could attend my annual Michigan CUPA conference. Normally, Paul and I love a good drive but it rained, at times heavily, most of the way up. We did stop and take some lovely pictures of the Mackinac Bridge as it had stopped raining, at least for a bit. I missed a whole lot of trees because of the rain and the lack of scenic turnoffs. The state needs to get better about this whole tourist thing.

My conference was hosted by three colleges up north - MTU, Northern and LSSU. It was a great group of people and the conference itself was actually hosted at a local casino. It could have a been a magnificent time but because of the incredible amount of smoke (and the smokers), it really killed some of the fun for us. There was a constant smoke haze inside the entire building. Even our suitcases smell like smoke....

We got out a whole bunch! We went out to dinner with our friend (and immigration attorney) Scott. We had to stop a the VFW and the American Legion in Sault Ste Marie and drove around doing some site-seeing - frankly anything to get out of the building.

The hotel gave us 'free' tokens to play. We got $20 of tokens the first day and then $10 the next day. We played them and saved everything we won. I don't think that's what the casino wants you to do with them but we did, and end up with out $80 in total winnings. Paul, the black jack wiz, won $40. SWEET!

I did go to the presentations and heard some great presentations on compensation and performance appraisals (everyone's favorite topic). There were some good presenters scheduled on Friday but I woke up with painfully bloodshot eyes and a sore throat - all from cigarette smoke. It really was awful. As much as I enjoyed the conference, I will not be returning to a casino. Ever.

We picked up Samson on Saturday. He was happy to see us but oh-so-tired from spending three days running and playing with his friends at Whiskers. He needed a quick bath when he got home (he was a LITTLE stinky) and he promptly went to sleep. It's soooo good to be home. We all agree, including Samson.

1 comment:

Lisa said...

So, when you said in your 9/30 post you might end up smoking cigarettes to fill in the holes of your techie addiction...you weren't kidding!?!

At least you came home with a bit of money in your pockets - always a good thing.

Welcome back to the real world.

L.