Sorry to have been so quiet the past two days--I've been on the road. On Tuesday, I took a personal day to go hang out with my sisters, mom and dad. My sister Larc came to visit from her home in Italy, and my sister Jayne came up from North Carolina to hang for a few days with me, my other sister Becky, who lives in Connecticut, and my parents at the old homestead in West Hartford, Conn. Being so far-flung, we seldom all get together, and it was pretty special to be able to carve out some time to just hang out together.
Then Wednesday, I headed down to Garden City, Long Island, for our annual franchise meeting (it used to be the sales meeting, but now that everyone from editorial to circulation and marketing shows up, we renamed it). More on that later, but I have to run to breakfast soon. So a bit of road zen I had on the way down: As a telecommuter, I am completely out of touch with the whole traffic thing, so it was kind of interesting to get stuck at numerous points on my trip down from Hartford yesterday. Like when I was stuck just around where I crossed the N.Y. border due to road construction. I was just starting to get that cranky thing going on, when the radio station started playing a block of old Lynard Skynard tunes--including an unplugged version of "Sweet Home Alabama" that just got me rocking out. I was bopping around in my car, singing at the top of my lungs, and having a grand old time! When we finally started moving again, people in cars around me were giving me a thumbs up and smiling as we jockeyed for the coveted left lane.
If I had to deal with traffic jams everyday, my attitude would probably be different, but yesterday, I actually enjoyed having some time to just be one with some old tunes that still can reconnect me to my wild teenager side.
I'll probably not be posting much more today, but tomorrow I'll catch up with all the stuff I have stashed away for when I have a few moments to type some stuff up. Stay cool (it's supposed to top 90 degrees here again today)!
P.S. If I had a brain in my head, I would have tried to arrange another day off tomorrow and stayed here and tried to get into the Belmont Stakes on Saturday--even if we don't have a shot at a triple crown winner this year, I've always wanted to go to a triple crown race. Of course, I also wanted to be a jockey when I was a kid, so this isn't too surprising.