Sick today, though I dragged myself into work anyway. I looked so bad my compatriots found the house docter (literally, the attending physician of the Congress of the United States, no less!) who examined me and concluded I had a severe respiratory sydrome in my head and lungs, a perforated eardrum (I had lost the hearing in my left in a few days ago), and conjunctivitis, aka Pink Eye, something I had once as a kid, which made my eyes super-red and watery, and was contagious as can be. I had no choice but to return to the hotel in the afternoon, with Jane taking over my rehearsal room, and Steve taking over Jane’s. Thank goodness I had planned for the contingency by bringing Steve on board back in 2008, but I never dreamed it would be ME he’d end up filling in for! I always figured it would be one of the older folks in the crew, like 78 year old Hubby! Oh well, at least the contract was being fulfilled, though I hated missing even a minute of it!
Archives for 2012
Sunday, August 26, 2012 – House Doctor Diagnoses, Sent Home to Hotel
Saturday, August 25, 2012 – Schedule Filling Up, Feeling Ill
Worked with some more speakers today, with Steve as our floater, filling in all the cracks between the rehearsal rooms, the stage, the participants lounge, scheduling and the speechwriters. Started to seriously not feel well, though, it seems the bug I got is finally overtaking me.
Friday, August, 24, 2012 – First Customers, Steve Arrives, Birthday Dinner
Had a couple of speakers come in to rehearse today, a good start. Our second subcontractor Steve arrived, got him up to speed as well, then at the end of the day, we all headed over to the hotel restaurant for a nice dinner with the four of us, plus one other gentleman who has been at all of the last 5 conventions with us (and then some, I think), and it turned out to be a lovely little dinner party to celebrate my birthday.
Thursday, August 23, 2012 – Jane Arrives
Our subcontractor and friend Jane arrived, and we got her caught up on systems and procedures. Everything on track for an efficient convention.
Wednesday, August 22, 2012 – First Day at RNCC
Took the hotel shuttle over to the Times Forum, which was already being surrounded by fences making it look like an invasion was impending, spent most of the day getting caught up on systems and procedures and getting organized for the upcoming job.
Tuesday, August 21, 2012 – Flight to Tampa
Finished packing in the morning, taxi to airport, flight on Southwest in the late afternoon. FROZE!!!! I kept getting colder and colder, and they had no blankets, and no matter how many times I asked the flight attendant essentially ignored me, then the landing was delayed because of weather. I spent the last hour of the flight curled into fetal position trying to stay warm, but by then I was shivering so bad, a deep down to the bone chill that felt like my connective tissues literally disconnected from the bones. It was horrible, and I knew I was going to end up getting sick, just what we didn’t need for the next 10 days!! It’s crazy, flying from 80 degree weather to 90 degree weather, and catching a cold because the flight was about 55 degrees (though honestly, it felt even colder than that!) It was raining when we landed, the airport was freezing so I couldn’t get warmed up, raining when we got into our car service, though I managed to talk the driver into taking off the air condition, freezing in every store we stopped in on our way to the hotel (welcome to Florida in August, where the indoor temperature is so cold that if it were that temperature up north, someone would put the heat on!), and finally freezing in the hotel lobby when we checked in. I couldn’t warm up for the life of me! Finally, we got checked into our room, which had a lovely balcony overlooking the river, so I opened the patio door and sat outside where I FINALLY was able to get a bit warmed up. I knew it was too late, though, and one of the stops was a drug store for some cold medicine, because I knew I was going to get sick. We ended up ordering room service because we knew the restaurant would be too cold, a nice bowl of stew was just the thing! Comfy room, we got a pretty good night sleep.Monday, August 20, 2012 – Laundry, Shopping and Packing
Determined we needed to pick up a few things to take with us, in addition to doing all of the laundry. The one drawback here at Jock’s is that there is no water at the outbuilding, we need to fetch it with the horse trailer whenever we get low, so a laundromat is, alas, the only reasonable way to get it done. The older woman at Mr. Clean wasn’t exactly friendly, we seemed to disturb her space, so we were glad to get out of there. Did some last minute shopping before getting home and doing as much packing as possible. Looking forward to a good night sleep, I feel like I still haven’t fully recovered from all our recent activity, and we’ll need all the energy we can get for the next 10 days!
Sunday, August 19, 2012 – Pack and Clean
Spent the day “drycleaning” all of our suits and business clothes, as we will need a lot of them for the upcoming Convention in Tampa. Nine working days means 10 different outfits for me, while Hubby will be swapping between multiple suits and blazers (men have it so easy!) Starting doing some packing, then relaxed as much as we could, try to rest up before our busy week.
Saturday, August 18, 2012 – Rest/Work Day
Did manage to sleep late, thankfully, then spent most of the day catching up on two months of paperwork that I’ve let slide, glad that job’s done! Relaxed during the evening, discovered some open movie channels on Dish so we recorded some new movies for later. We may have recorded just a few too many western programs during our last few absences… : -). Made a few decisions about how we are going to pursue our Fall tour of New England as well.
Friday, August 17, 2012 – Pick up Hearing Aid
The day we’ve been waiting for has arrived! Hubby was jumping up and down like a kid in anticipation of getting his hearing aid. I worked on the computer until it was time to go, then we headed up to Costco in Dedham, MA, where Rick finished his fitting and showed him all the features of his new ears, including warnings that all the new sounds are likely going to make him dizzy (which they did). He was so thrilled, though, as I am. For the first time in a long time, I don’t have to yell at him just to have a conversation, and during the evening, the volume on the TV was so low that I was having trouble hearing it! Love it! He knew his ears were getting bad, he just didn’t realize how bad. What a relief! Off to bed, looking forward to sleeping late and putting some more deposits in our sleep bank.