Fly Away. Home.

I left last Wednesday morning to go to Austin for a two-day meeting. The trip was fine, although I ended up leaving about three hours later than planned due to fog, but I still arrived well before bed time and was able to have dinner out with co-workers at a Japanese steakhouse.

Thursday and Friday were meetings and more meetings, but part of the whole deal was a team-building activity. Part of the group rode bikes around Austin and part of the group rode Segways. I was in the Segway group because I figured I probably wouldn't get the chance to ride one again anytime soon. I'm glad I did it -- and if Segways only cost $200 (instead of $5500), I'd probably buy one. They're a bit tricky to get the hang of initially, but within ten minutes everyone was doing quite well on them. Sure, two people took spills, but nothing major, just watch out for curbs.

The company that ran the tour was stretched pretty thin by the 20 or so of us that showed up, but they did a great job coralling everyone and making sure we all had functioning vehicles. That's pretty impressive because I think they were told there'd be 12 of us. Whoops.

Dinner was next and I had a great time talking to the other people who do what I do from around the world, but the food wasn't so good. Honestly, it didn't matter, it was all about the conversation. Although I kept thinking I'd rather be home with my girl.

Friday was more meetings, then the trip back to Seattle, which went off without a hitch. Plus I was able to upgrade to better seats, so my ride was pretty comfy. Nice.

I spent most of Saturday with Julia; shopping, having some delicious Indian food, and trying to see a movie, but nothing really appealed. It was nice to have a break.

Sunday I ran my D&D game. They had a nasty encounter with a dire shark and Seth's character was killed when the shark swallowed him whole. It was actually an interesting session, because we were all laughing and having a good time, but Seth's character died which isn't how character death is usually handled in games I've played in or run. Usually it's a sort of stressful and annoying, but not in this case for some reason. Even though the dice rolls for him to avoid his fate were basically impossible. Maybe that's part of what made it funny. Anyway, they were able to rescue his body and get him raised at their next port of call. Future encounters should be a bit more well balanced, thankfully.

Julia spent the time while I was gaming upstairs in the kitchen (with the recently fixed oven) making pies. She baked two pumpkin pies and an apple pie. Wow, were they good. All of them. I was only able to have a piece of each by the end of the night, so the rest went to work with her, which was fine because Monday I started the diet again. But, yum, good pie.

Monday I continued writing and am making good progress.

Tonight, I go to play Warhammer with the Tuesday crew. It should be fun.