Hello, it's me

I know that the title there is not grammatically correct, but I have that song running through my head, in Paul Giamatti's voice from the movie Duets. Shut up; it was good!!

Anyway, in that movie, Paul Giamatti hurries into this meeting for which he's late, gives a presentation to the group, and suddenly realizes that he's talking to a bunch of chicken farmers or something in Texas, when he thought he was in Florida talking to a bunch of amusement park investors. Or something. The point is that he's on the road so much he can't tell which end is up, and he's just living in airport hotels and slowly going batty. This is where I fear I'm heading, that next week I'll go out for cigarettes and never go back to work, trading it all in for a life on the road to karaoke.

Not really, but I am tired, tired, tired of traveling; luckily, the end is in sight, at least for now. I just arrived in San Francisco, one of my very favorite places, but I'm here less than 24 hours, so it's a little bit of a drag. But I'm delighted to have Elite status on the plane, and to be in a lovely, smoke-free hotel room with free high-speed internet and friendly staff. Heaven.

I first visited San Francisco on a family trip through California when I was 10, and it was my very first business trip, so I always get a little nostalgic when I'm here. As I was heading down the escalator in the airport, I realized that I haven't been here in four years; the last time, I had just started dating the Smelmooo, and I called him from that escalator to let him know I'd arrived safely. It had only been a couple of months, but I had already fallen hard for him, and missed him terribly. So I have some extra-special nostalgia this time, smiling as I think about how lucky and happy I am, and marveling at how quickly the time has gone by.

Work trips (to good places, anyway -- I suspect I may not feel this way next week in Missouri) always get me thinking about fabulous vacations, far away from my laptop and meetings and voice mail messages. There are a million places I want to visit with the Smelmooo, but among the top ten, I think, is the Bay Area and wine country. Maybe we'll do a big fat trip and throw Vegas and the Grand Canyon in there as well, in one fell swoop. But for now, we're seeing each other pretty much in our dreams and in passing, although both our travel schedules will be easing up soon, fortunately.

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While I'm here, I'll give you a rundown of the highlights of the last week, since I have been delinquent in updating this space:

-- Hande and I saw Just Like Heaven on opening weekend, and although it was almost surely not an empirically great movie, I loved it anyway, almost despite myself. It sucked me in, without my even realizing it, and suddenly I'd just be choking up or laughing out loud. Although I totally saw the Tony Danza thing that Minnams sees in Mark Ruffalo, albeit fleetingly.

-- I started Tucker in "puppy kindergarten," which means I get to cross another item off my list, which I'll update at some point. He did pretty well, although I got chastised for being wimpy when I told him "OFF!" when he got jumpy. I think it's largely because I think it's fun when Tucker jumps up on me, so my heart wasn't really in it, even though I know it's unacceptable behavior outside of the immediate family. Seven more to go; we'll see how it goes.

-- I thought the Emmys were kind of boring -- probably because I don't watch most of the shows that won, and also because my expectations for Ellen were too high because of my recent obsession with her -- but I thought that so many of the women looked amazing, and there were some great, great moments, my favorites being Felicity Huffman's speech, the woman who lost her acceptance speech in her dress, and William Shatner's face when it was announced that Donald Trump won the sing-off.

-- I am watching more TV now that we have DVR. I am liking the new season of Gilmore Girls very much, although I am hating, hating Luke's stupid hair. Leave his baseball cap on, please. I didn't enjoy Head Cases -- I couldn't even watch the whole thing -- but I did like My Name Is Earl and the first episode of The Office. I'm on the fencde about How I Met Your Mother; I think I'm leaning toward "it's annoying" and crossing it off the list, but I may give it another go next week.

-- Something must be in the water at work, because every meeting I was in yesterday was rife with totally inappropriate innuendo, including from one of our lawyers (whose job it is, as someone pointed out, to keep this kind of thing out of the workplace). Everyone always looks at me when these kinds of remarks come out, because they know I'm going to be completely red-faced and mortified. I've recently decided that I'm uncomfortable less because I'm personally offended than that I'm worried that other people are going to be offended and it's going to get ugly, although I know that some of it is just my being a little bit uptight and prudish.

-- We had Gina and Jack over for dinner the other night (and Gina made the most heavenly dessert, puff pastry filled with peaches and raspberries -- I'm not doing it justice, I'm sure, but yum), and ate on our nice china and stuff because it's a year old and we've only used it once before and I've decided that's absurd, but I realized that we don't have proper napkins. I mentioned this to a few people, all of whom have had proper dining rooms and dinnerware much longer than I have, and without exception they agreed that cloth napkins are a pain, and somehow they always seem dirty, and they are just not worth it. Maybe I will compromise and get some pseudo-elegant, heavier-duty paper napkins. Who am I that I concern myself with these things? I should focus on learning to make Gina-worthy desserts, if anything.

So now you're all caught up and, again, I prove my husband right, that I only blog when I'm out of town. Catch you on the other side of Kansas City, then.