8 days and finally home again

I got back on Tuesday afternoon and landed in my driveway around 4:45pm. I didn't bring my housekeys for 2 reasons:

1) I'd probably lose them somewhere
2) I figured C and A would be home before me

I was home first so I sat on the backstairs surrounded by bags and waited for C and A to get home. When they turned the corner into the driveway, the look on A's face was the best sight I had seen in a long time. You could tell that she was just as excited to see me as I was to see her.

Here is a brief recap of my travels (if you care, if not, just skip down about 3 paragraphs!)

Salt Lake City - left Providence around 1pm on Monday and landed in SLC around 6:30pm. Got the car, hit the hotel, and promptly ordered room service and started working. I was under a deadline so I worked most of the night. Here's some comedy for you though. The driver of the car service that picked me up at home I nicknamed Father Time. He was about 80 and when he saw my suitcase he said "typical woman packer". In my defense, I was going for 8 days, 3 cities, and both work and business so I needed a lot! So he gets it in the trunk and before we pull out of my driveway he starts popping pills. At this point, I was praying that he stayed alive long enough to get me to the airport. LOL After some pretty pointless meetings, I left SLC at 3pm on Wed.

San Francisco - this was the pleasure part of the trip. I landed at 4pm on Wed (gotta love time changes) and grabbed my bag, walked out the door, and my brother had just pulled up to the curb. We could not have timed that better. We then headed in the Mini (what a cute little car!) to his section of town called the Western Addition. I won't get into gory detail about everything we did while I was there so here is a bulleted list:
~ Tour of Alcatraz (very cool!)
~ Ate and drank a lot including Indian (really not a fan), Asian Fusion, French Seafood, pizza, and Ben & Jerry's. I ate with chopsticks for the first time ever and managed to try 3 new beers. Oh and drank WAY more coffee than I am used to!
~ The Chihuly Exhibit at the de Young. Absolutely amazing!
~ Walked around a few parts of Golden Gate Park
~ Went to Ocean Beach and then hiked up to Lands End
~ Of course, Fisherman's Wharf
~ Went to the Ferry Building and the markets
~ Walked down to the Marina and into the Presidio
~ Had lunch with a good friend who lives in Sacramento that I have not seen in years!
All in all, a great great trip to SF. I was sad to leave my brother and J and can't wait to see them in October. I do not miss those hills though. oy.

Virginia/DC - arrived at 12:15am on Sunday night/Monday morning. Waited at least 45min for my luggage. Took shuttle bus to Hertz. Got to my hotel at 1:30ish. In my room at 1:47am. Asleep at 3:48am. Up at 6:30am. You can imagine my state of mind at that point. Think a jet-lagged Rottweiler hopped up on caffeine. Yeah, that was me. Spent all day in meetings and then out to a great, great Italian restaurant in Reston. OMG the food was SO good. I had this for my entree:
Cappellacci di Zucca
Ravioli filled with butternut squash and walnuts; tomato sauce, brown butter, Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese and crispy sage

Absolute heaven!!! That along with fried calamari, bruschetta, and some killer dessert just about sent me into a coma. I stayed for the AM meetings on Tuesday and then headed to the airport. God I hate Dulles. What a freaking PITA airport.

I apologize for all the links in this post but I really felt I had to include them so you could see what I was talking about!

It's great to be home and back with my family! This weekend C is replacing the fence with help from 2 of his brothers. A and I will be running some errands and heading to Auntie Shelby's on Sunday AM for breakfast. C and I are also taking A to the Pumpkin Fest on Saturday. That should be a blast!