DEN - MPS - Iowa: The Holiday Week

While most of the country suffered transportation shutdown due to snow, Denver didn't do so bad, and was just plain old rotten cold. Since last I posted, I've been to a preseason Mammoth Lacrosse game, scrambled to finish most holiday shopping, went to Iowa via Minneapolis and back for the Christmas holiday with family and now back after some delay (of course.....) at airport due to severe fog and "ice pellets" in Minneapolis.

The photo is from 1935. A relative helping unload Christmas trees from a rail car in Iowa.

My favorite news item this season in Iowa is the use of the 18,000 pounds of excess, outdated garlic salt for use on icy roads. This was supplied by Tone Brothers spices of Iowa. Officials mixed the garlic salt with the road salt since there is a shortage of road salt this winter. I think the moral of the story is still "don't eat the yellow garlic snow"! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/12/23/garlic-salt-de-icing-road_n_153072.html This might be a little known fact that Tone Brothers in Iowa produces well known spices you might use in the kitchen today. http://www.spiceadvice.com/corporate/about_us.html

My luck when I arrived in Denver, there was a Power Outage - why? who knows... The weather is cold and windy, but alas, the power outage impacted the shuttle between concourses. I landed in B concourse this morning and poof - no walking just waiting and yet another travel delay to round out my year - how appropriate!

I did go to see Doubt http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0918927/ and did enjoy it. I had to think about whether I "enjoyed it" for a couple days, but yes, I am glad I saw it. It was disturbing, felt like a boxing match at times in a good way, and provided tough questions on a difficult topic. Now for the lighter movies for the rest of the year starting tonight!

STL: Last Business Trip of the Year

What a trip to round out the year, here to St. Louis, MO on Frontier! I completed my minimum program status for Frontier, and rounded out three airline miles program achievements for 2009 (Hotel program status was met earlier in the 4th quarter for those of you tracking my revenue and booking numbers).

Concluding a good business meeting with Dave Robb here in St. Louis, we drove to the airport in rain. Dave got on his somewhat delayed flight to Atlanta and should be arriving about now at 10:25pm Atlanta time. I, on the otherhand, am still in lovely St. Louis, waiting for that LAST business flight of the year.

The 'one hour delayed due to snow in Denver" Frontier flight landed, and we were told "there's a mechanical issue and we'll keep you posted".....That was about 7:30pm Central. It's now 9:30pm Central as I watch the rain POUR outside at 30 degrees F, just about freezing.....Frontier is deadheading a plane here with parts from Denver. It is scheduled to land at 10:20pm Central with the "parts" for the other plane, and the flight crew will take the "good plane" and whisk us back to Denver yet tonight - in theory. Tomorrow and Saturday are "green days" and apparently all flights are booked with a big thank you to our troops as the various airlines are flying military folks all over the country (I assume my tax dollars are providing this free flight situation in some fashion -not really the airlines, right? How can they afford that? Lower gas prices or something?)

Of course, after sitting on hold with my work travel agency for well over 55 minutes, I booked one flight for a high dollar at noon tomorrow if everything doesn't work out tonight...... Maybe I can take a flight to somewhere WARM if I can't get to Denver.....

I was telling Dave over dinner last night about the blog and how I needed something bloggable from my trip. Wish Dave well and provide him happy thoughts next Tuesday as he's having his shoulder "done" under the scope. Here's to a speedy recovery for Dave and a hope that I will be in Denver sometime before sunrise!

DEN, ORD - Nutcracker, Milk, Jewels!

Over the weekend after arriving home from the weeks travels to Chicago and Portland, OR, I went to see the Moscow Ballet's Nutcracker at the Paramount Theater in Denver. http://www.nutcracker.com/ The performance was dazzling and very athletic. Full of color and humor and awe, the dancers performed on the stage of the old Paramount Theater in Denver. I highly recommend the show if in your area. http://www.paramountdenver.com/

The following night, keeping with old theater theme, I went to see MILK at the Mayan, another old theater, mayan revival style and restored. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayan_Revival MILK was a great film about the first gay activist, Harvey Milk. Sean Penn does a wonderful job in my opinion with the role, stretching his performances like Meryl Streep. I have to give "Milk" a big thumb's up - but wonder what awards it will take at the Oscars.

Arriving home from a quick but FREEZING cold trip to Chicago, I was thrilled to receive on my door step, some fabulous Belgium Chocolates Jewel Collection from a business partner! How glorious to open the box and enjoy the chocolates along with my new diamond, ruby and Rolex set! THANK YOU, you're fabulous :)

It's off to St. Louis and the Gateway Arch! This the last business trip of 2008 (let's hope) :)

FAR: Hotel Donaldson

One redeeming factor of flying into Fargo, ND on the Sunday after Thanksgiving is to be able to go to the Hotel Donaldson, in downtown Fargo for fabulous appetizers and dinner, and have coffee the next morning at the Atomic Coffee Shop. Oh - I guess that was two reasons :) Truly the website says it all - this will change your image of Fargo (mine too). Before the Hotel Donaldson, all I could think about was the movie Fargo and hoped I would not be living it while working there!

http://www.hoteldonaldson.com/

Sorry so short, but at least I posted, right :)