Rich's Trip to Boston

Oh man, what a wild trip. I'm in Boston (actually Bedford, a suburb of Boston) for a meeting with all of the Progress Software North American Users Group Presidents. I do this every year about this time. Had a great first day and a super steak dinner.

Normally we meet in mid-January, but this year we had to change it. I usually fly out on Alaska, there's only one flight out (Portland to Seattle to Boston) so I fly out the day before. I couldn't do that this time because Riley and I were going to the Monster Truck show Sunday (yesterday). I found a flight that took me from Portland to San Francisco to Boston (on the red eye) which allowed me to take him to the Monster Truck show and still get me here in time for the meeting that started at Noon.

Everything started fine, got to PDX on time, plane left on time, simple no problem flight to San Francisco. Then the problems started.

First, I had to leave the security area to go to another terminal and go back through security. A minor hassle, but it was made a little more of a problem because I had a Sprite in my backpack from Portland that I forgot to remove. TSA wasn't happy about that. They weren't rude or mean, just not nice. Sprite got thrown away and I was on my way. Found the gate only to see the plane was delayed an hour and a half - instead of leaving at 11:30pm I was leaving at 1am!

Great.

Downloaded the photos from the Monster Truck show, looked at some other photos, was going to get online but SF wanted $9.99/day and I wasn't about to pay that. Why can't everyone be like PDX and have free wireless?? Then I started watching Family Guy on my Playstation Portable. That was fun but I had a hard time staying awake.

Finally we boarded. Luck was with me, no one else was in my row so I had all three seats to myself. I stretched out and slept. Next thing I knew I heard the pilot saying we were getting ready to land. I remember some bumps, but mostly I slept really well. A bumpy landing, but nothing bad.

I made my way to the shuttle area and of course the transportation I arranged wasn't there. I figured it wouldn't be. Called them and was told I gave him the wrong flight number. I told him that's the number that was on my ticket. Whatever the case, he couldn't have someone there for another two hours. I couldn't wait. Found a taxi. Asked if he knew how to get to the hotel (showed him the address) and of course he said, "Sure, no problem!" After we get on the freeway he's calling his dispatch asking how to get there. ARGH!!! I ended up showing him the way when we finally got closer. He was nice, just clueless on driving. I swear I thought we were not going to make it, that we'd end up in an accident the way this guy was driving. I really was surprised I made it.

Got here and my room wasn't ready. ARGH #2!!!!! I told them I just wanted some place to shower before my meeting started. She was nice and found me another room that was perfectly fine. Got my shower and got to my meeting on time. From there on everything was great and I had a super day.

A major pain getting here, but I stayed calm and kept a cool head, and left plenty of time to get here, so everything was fine. I get to leave tomorrow, my flight gets in at 11:44pm. A long couple days, but worth it. Now I'm going to get a good nights sleep so I'm awake tomorrow. :)