Private flight to Boise, Idaho

Some of you may have seen my note on Facebook about my unexpected trip to Boise for work.  My boss asked me if I could go today and tomorrow to do some training for a new project that we're working on.

Imagine my surprise when I find out that we're going in his private plane!  Turns out that he and his wife and another couple need to go to Montana, so they decided to drop me and my cohort off in Boise on the way.  So, about 8:30 this morning I arrived at the Scottsdale airport and drove right up to this plane.  They drove my car away to hold until we get back and I climbed aboard (after a few pics).  Crazy, huh?

Part of the fun of this trip was seeing my friends, Phil the pilot (and Mark his co-pilot).  I hadn't seen them in a while.  I've never had the privilege of riding in the plane before, so this was a REAL treat!

This is what it looks like on the inside.  There are 6 seats, plus 2 for the pilots.  Very comfy and everything you need, like cup holders, pull up tables, electrical outlets, etc.  After about a 2 hour flight, we arrived in Boise and they brought our rental car right to us. 

We spent the afternoon learning and gathering information for the project.

This is the view from our hotel window.  There are snow capped mountains in the background.  The temperature right now is 47 degrees and it's windy with a chance of showers (as you can probably tell).  Tomorrow the sky's supposed to clear up a bit, but the high is still only forecast for 56.  I don't mind though because it's just one more day that it won't be hot.

Tomorrow we go back for more training, then we'll meet up with the others and the plane late afternoon or early evening to fly back home.

What a fun trip and I can see why people that can afford it, go this way.  It's so much less stressful than fighting the crowds at the big airports.

My Dad the Iron Worker
My dad passed away when I was 20 years old, but I came across these photos a couple of days ago that reminded me of him. He was an iron worker, or structural steel worker. He was the one that built steel high rises, bridges and more. He didn't wear any kind of safety harness and walked 10 or 20 stories above the ground on steel I-beams that weren't more than a few inches wide.

Can you imagine that? There's no way I could even think of doing that, even when I was young and irresponsible. My mom said she saw him working on a high rise once and never went to see him at work again because it made her so nervous to see him up so high.

He tried to quit construction work at one point when his brother was killed on a construction site, but work was hard to come by and the money was great, so he went back to it. He was often the foreman or superintendent on the jobs he worked. We've heard many accounts of what a great, responsible, caring boss he was.

These photos really make me appreciate the risks he took to provide for his family.

Check out these photos of my "big" (well...older) sister at work.

She was taking inventory at the microwave tower sites for Central Arizona Project. She went to 4 mountaintop sites with two electronics techs, the photographer and of course the pilot.

Pretty cool, huh?

Sometimes I really LOVE my job!!!!

One of the aspects of being an Event Manager is the long tedious hours of site visits at resort after resort at vacation destinations. It actually is pretty tiring, especially if you have a lot of places to visit, but it's one of my favorite parts of the job.

Fortunately, this weekend I'm going on a 2nd visit to the place we chose for a fund-raising retreat that Leadership Catalyst is doing in November. My hubby and I will visit the Four Seasons Aviara Resort in Carlsbad, CA and get to stay overnight and pamper ourselves in one of their gorgeous rooms. We'll be meeting with our coordinator from the resort as well as our friends, Don & Carol to look at the meeting room and discuss questions that we have about the event. Don is our tech expert and will help us make all the necessary decisions and ask all the right questions about our audio-visual set up for the event.

Since we'll be over there anyway for our Monday meeting, we decided to make a weekend of it, even though we just got back from vacation a few weeks ago. We'll be staying just north of San Diego for the first night, because we can't afford to PAY for a night at Aviara. Well, I guess we COULD afford it, but don't really WANT to spend that much money for one night in a hotel room.


I hope we get a chance to check out this awesome fireplace while we're there. Doesn't it look so inviting for when the temps dip below 70 degrees? The highs are expected to be in the mid-70's and lows in the mid-60's, which is pretty close to paradise, I'd say. Even as I type this I have to force myself to pack a sweater and long sleeves for the evenings. It's just so hard to imagine after 105 degree high temp today.

I'm sure you can tell that all these pics are from the resort website, but I'll be taking more while we're out and about and I'll try to post while I'm there.

Another cool thing...I get to use a work day and don't have to take vacation...because I really AM working. YES, I AM and please don't tell my co-workers how much I enjoy it. I think they're jealous already.

It's discouraging when I post news and don't get any comments. Is it because no one's reading or just not interested? I guess it's my own fault since I've been too busy to post much. Things are looking up at work though and I'm praying that things will quiet down in the coming weeks. If so, I should have more energy and time for things at home, family, friends and other ministry, and church...

Pajama Day!

Yesterday was my last day at home after being off work since Dec 22nd. I ended up having a pajama day. I literally stayed in my pajamas all day and wasn't even sick! I haven't done that in years. I did a lot of catch up on the computer and preliminary planning for the new year, then at the end of the day, Terry and I watched a movie.

He's had a cold all week long. Fortunately he was off work too, but it still dragged on. He's still not over it, but he gets to stay home one more day because of the Day of Mourning for President Ford. His company closes whenever the stock market is closed, so they gave him the option of working for overtime pay or staying home. He chose to stay home, duh! I would have done the same.

Even though I like my job, I'm not looking forward to going back to work today. I would just rather be home more and more. Having Terry and Kevin both at home, makes it that much harder to leave. And of course, all those projects I was planning last week didn't get done, so they're still waiting here for me.

Well, my time's up...I have to hit the road to get to work. Traffic should be great today though and the drive is usually only about 10 minutes anyway. I'm sure I'll be fine once I get there with a week's worth of emails and projects to catch up on.

I'm looking forward to the new year, but hoping to find a way to have at least one day at home during the week...we'll see...