Mish Mash
I'm in Denver, at a conference for work. I have been PowerPointed to exhaustion, but I did have the opportunity to spend a night at the home of my friend CM, her husband Emergency Man (as in Fixing Of, not as in Creating), and their amazingly independent and adorable kid, the BookYanker. It was wonderful to see them all (especially poor CM, who managed to be warm, funny and hostessy after one of a long string of 12-hour days - may I say how much we should all appreciate the pain of medical residents, and thank them for their labors on our behalf?), and I even got to see downtown Denver, which shocked me by being pedestrian-friendly, attractive, and stocked with some nice old buildings and some nice new buildings. Also, my hosts had an inspiring quote on their fridge about the importance of committing to whatever you're doing, which I really liked.
Other things I've experienced:
1. A gorgous Midwestern thunderstorm, which caught up with me as I was hiking the 2 miles back to my hotel after today's PowerPointing - I saw a real double rainbow! Also, the smell of rain on dry ground, which is high on the infinitely long list of things I will miss when I'm dead.
2. A hotel full of middle-aged Swedes. Motorcycling Swedes, on a tour of the Western United States. Let me repeat this - A POSSE OF MOTORCYCLING SWEDES. I saw them by the pool, sunbathing, and then later saw them outside in the parking lot during the FIRST fire alarm, and they were all wearing black socks and sandals. I was delighted, and tried some Swedish on them. They were terribly polite about it, as one would expect from motorcycling Swedes, but I don't think they actually understood anything I said.
3. Learning something that I thought was really interesting (and probably should have known already) - the best predictor of health in an American person is literacy skills. Not age, not race, not income - literacy! (I'm not sure of how accurate this is, but it's interesting even if it's not quite true.) And that 1 in 4 Americans did not read even a single book last year. That was depressing.
4. On the plane, I read a book about parenting an introverted child, and it was super-interesting. More on that later, as I'm approaching the end of my time limit on the Jurassic-era computers in the "Business Center."
5. I have now had two evenings of being able to decompress in peace after a long day. Nobody to feed, nobody to wash, no tantrums. Nobody to be nice to, even - all I have to do is find myself some food, check my email, take a bath, and watch bad TV! But I can't wait to get home.
Other things I've experienced:
1. A gorgous Midwestern thunderstorm, which caught up with me as I was hiking the 2 miles back to my hotel after today's PowerPointing - I saw a real double rainbow! Also, the smell of rain on dry ground, which is high on the infinitely long list of things I will miss when I'm dead.
2. A hotel full of middle-aged Swedes. Motorcycling Swedes, on a tour of the Western United States. Let me repeat this - A POSSE OF MOTORCYCLING SWEDES. I saw them by the pool, sunbathing, and then later saw them outside in the parking lot during the FIRST fire alarm, and they were all wearing black socks and sandals. I was delighted, and tried some Swedish on them. They were terribly polite about it, as one would expect from motorcycling Swedes, but I don't think they actually understood anything I said.
3. Learning something that I thought was really interesting (and probably should have known already) - the best predictor of health in an American person is literacy skills. Not age, not race, not income - literacy! (I'm not sure of how accurate this is, but it's interesting even if it's not quite true.) And that 1 in 4 Americans did not read even a single book last year. That was depressing.
4. On the plane, I read a book about parenting an introverted child, and it was super-interesting. More on that later, as I'm approaching the end of my time limit on the Jurassic-era computers in the "Business Center."
5. I have now had two evenings of being able to decompress in peace after a long day. Nobody to feed, nobody to wash, no tantrums. Nobody to be nice to, even - all I have to do is find myself some food, check my email, take a bath, and watch bad TV! But I can't wait to get home.
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