Travels and Vacation (part 1)

It really has been a whirlwind summer this year. At the end of June it, was off to California for a week's worth of meetings with colleagues from around the world, and since I was already that direction, of course I had to stay on for a few days and at least see my mom, if I wasn't going to make it back to the hometown 'burg this trip.

So, after the work part was all done (which means long days where almost every moment is planned from the time you wake up until at least 10 pm at night, day after day) it was a quick flight for a few days of playing in Vegas! Acutally, quite a few of my international colleagues had the same idea, so it could have been like a mini convention, but I didn't see a single face I recgonized in our three days there.

The real purpose for doing Las Vegas now, this year, was that this was the last year of Celine Dion's 5 year run at Ceasear's Palace. Mom and I were in Las Vegas in January 2003, when the Theatre for her show was being finished, and we kind of made a pact that we'd be back to see that show before it ended. It was originally only a three year show, which the pregnancy and arrival of my Little Man pretty wiped wiped out the option for. When the show was extended through the end of 2007 though.....we had to go! I know no-one is actually supposed to admit to liking her music, but the theatre has 4,000 seats which were, even in it's fifth year at 4 or 5 shows a week, for 40 weeks of the year, at least 80% full. For the record, it was an incredible show!

So, Vegas was great...we shopped, we slept out, we were at the pool at 11pm when it was still 90 degrees outside.....it was hot! This may seem like a no-brainer, but I mean it was hot like 'step outside and feel your fingers swell like sausages' hot. It was a great excuse to spend the days in air-conditioned shops and theme hotels (we like the Ventian, in case you can't tell from our flickr photo album) but as soon as you stepped outside the heat hit you like a wall. Overall, I enjoyed this trip, but I'd plan the next trip for winter or spring.

I missed my Little Man, but it was also 10 days to just be me. Sometimes it's nice to remember I'm not only Kevin Daniels' Mommy (although I love having that responsibility 99.9% of the time!)