There's no place like home...

Ahhh...it feels so good to be home, except I'm sick. I seem to have picked up a sore throat and cold somewhere along the way, but it felt good to sleep in my own bed last night. As much fun as it is to not have to cook or clean up and to go out with your friends a few nights, that's about my limit - a few nights. I'm lucky that my job doesn't require much travel, and I like it that way right now.

A few more notes about my trip. Eight of us did go on the evening Segway tour of the monuments on Wednesday evening, followed by a delicious dinner at DC Coast. Again, worth it just to ride the machine, but we did get a slightly different tour. It was a little tougher to ride at night, I found, as you have to really pay attention for obstacles in your path. And we all had to wear little red blinking lights on us so that no cars would hit us! But we all had a really good time. Next year's conference is in San Francisco, and we already found out that there are Segway tours there! We also took over the Daily Grille on Tuesday evening for the Sox game and had a great time despite the loss.

While I was in DC, I stayed at the historic Mayflower Hotel. The ballroom we were in for meetings was the site of Calvin Coolidge's inaugural ball in 1925, and there has been an inauguration ball there for every president since. However, Coolidge never attended his ball, as his 16-year old son had died of blood poisoning just before his inauguration and he was still mourning his loss. Harry Truman lived at the Mayflower for the first 90 days of his presidency. FDR wrote his inauguration speech there. J. Edgar Hoover at lunch there nearly every day he was in town. And did you know that the building has more gold than any other building in the country except for the Library of Congress?

And for those who have asked about the Bush impersonator, his name is Steve Bridges. If you go to his website, and click on the Performance Videos, there is a classic segment of him with the real President Bush doing a routine at the White House correspondent's dinner. He also has an exclusive contract with Leno to do the Tonight Show. Interesting, he also does Clinton and Schwarzeneggar routines. He uses academy award-winning makeup artist from Driving Miss Daisy. Watch some of the videos...they're very funny!

Now that I'm home, guess what Miss Sophie can do now? She can push her little walker toy on her own! Check it out!

And tonight before dinner, she snacked on some mini shredded wheats. What a mess those things make...they're not kidding about the "shredded" part!