On happy returns

This is why I'm hot.

Okay, so I'm back, and regular blogging can now resume (more or less as soon as I've cleared this pile of work-related crap off of my desk). The trip was largely uneventful, save for the opportunity to get voluntarily bumped in exchange for a voucher (sweet! Skokie, Illinois, here I come) and one evening at dinner where we... Well, we'll just say we didn't expect the joke to go as far as it did, and he was totally a sport. Anyway, my coworker and I did all of the fun touristy stuff, going to the top of the Arch and whatnot, and we conferenced, and we got home safely (and, in my case, about seven pounds heavier than when I left - hello to the gourmet hotel food), and that makes it a good trip, in my eyes.

I don't know if conferences were supposed to be as fun as ours was - the conference director did mention that ours was the first group to start a drinking game during a session ("Robust!" "Hey!") - but I'm fairly sure that a good time was had by all but that one prat from Kennesaw State who couldn't stop talking about how much he hated marketing people. I mean, as many conferences as I tagged along to with my dad, not once did any presenter ever pull out this video:



Good times.

The funny thing is that, the whole time we were in St. Louis, temperatures were in the mid-90s and people kept jokingly accusing us of bringing the hot, muggy Birmingham weather up with us on purpose. Then Wednesday, our plane lands in Birmingham and the captain informs us that the temperature here is 101. So I guess the joke is on... well, us, still. It's shoe-meltingly hot, and as miserable as I am, that's still with the benefit of central air conditioning.

And I guess my question would have to be, What the hell are you people doing when I'm not here? I turn my back for a second and a half, and suddenly temperatures are in the triple digits, the Dems caved and President Bush is listening in on people's phone calls, respectable Republicans are trying to go down on cops in public bathrooms, and K-Fed is filing for custody.

This is why we can't have nice things.