2006-05-13

trip report pt. 2 @ 8:30 p.m.

Thursday morning came too early. My paper journal says

TWO WORDS: hung. over.

I realized a very unfortunate thing as I wobbled around in the room before bed the night before: I'd forgotten step three of my failsafe hangover remedy: immodium. Other than the obvious, it also kills the general nausea/ickiness that accompanies a hangover and I take a dose plus advil and plenty of water before succumbing to sleep after a night of debauchery. I sincerely paid for that forgetfulness the following morning. So, working out was not on the menu. Trying to get to a point where I could leave the room by 8 AM was. Then the toilet, which had already been suspiciously slow, stopped working completely. And to top it off, I started my monthly shed.

Somehow I got it together and moved slowly downstairs for the opening session of the actual conference. Found Doc B slumped in a chair looking over his foundation response to a presentation by the chica who heads up the collaborative. He sounded crunchy and actually asked me what I thought about a portion of his speech. Grabbed some juice but couldn't drink it; my stomach still felt suspect, so I sat there and listened intently.

The session mentioned above was moderated by my schizophrenic CEO and focused on the work two collaborative type programs sponsored by the CDC, the foundation and one of the DC orgs, with response from reps from those orgs respectively. After all that was a Q & A from the audience which ended too quickly for his taste, so he starts calling on people to just comment. I had dashed quickly to the bathroom one last time and was really feeling much better when he did the unthinkable

Well let's hear from someone from the collaborative itself on how they've been doing. I see DivaMel back there from my institute, why don't you come and tell us how things are going? Heh! Heh! Heh!

-slow blink- PFL and the local peeps are sitting at the table with me, as this is the last session they'll be attending due to content (the foundation only funded up to that point, after that they would have needed to fund themselves and the institute pulled cash for me out of a slush account). I know for certain that I am the last person she would have chosen to do such a thing in front of the esteemed guests, but when the CEO pulls you out of his butt and 200+ people are staring expectantly at you, you haul ass to the mic in the middle of the floor. I remembered to thank the foundation, the network and the two folks heading up the collabo and then dove into a quick talk about how we all were benefitting from the enhancement grant and accompanying activities, even the states who weren't members but were there today. I even had the good sense to talk about how we were desperate to keep the incredible momentum we had going and that future funding -stares directly at Doc B from the foundation at the table on the stage- was crucial to keep these efforts going.

People seemed impressed. Let's hope so. Some were certain that we'd set it up beforehand and I was very clear in setting them straight.

I was headed to the lunch session and asked the OK contingency who'd adopted me the night before if I could sit with them. Turns out they were ducking out for lunch and invited me along, which was fine with me. I was now officially on the institute's dime and could do whatever the fuck I wanted. Went to the Bourbon House where I had the most amazing pane�d veal (basically a fried veal cutlet) with Louisiana crabmeat served with fettuccine and topped with grated Romano cheese. And also was convinced by the Okies to give oysters one more try. I tried them decades ago as a child and found them abhorrent. But I thought the wee snotty looking muscles couldn't kill me even if I didn't like them, so I slid a freshly shucked glob from it's shell on to a cracker, passed some cocktail sauce over it and down it went.

Well, I'll be damned. Pass me another.

We wandered slowly back to the hotel and slid into the CDC marketing session a few minutes late. Was interrupted from that very interesting session by PFL tapping my shoulder and telling me that we were meeting with the consultant upstairs. -sigh- See as I said before, the open forum meeting lasted through lunch which overlapped the annual conference for the institute network, which they weren't funded for, hence the technical assistance meeting convening without considering my schedule. Bah. Silly me, I went and was still in "oh, I'm a legitimate participant/partner" mode and got into a lively discussion about our project's reviewer processes. Then PFL pipes up with a comment in direct response to one of mine about what my institute's role on a particular function had been with her usual smackdown of "the state department provides administrative oversight and funding and WE would do this thing now". At that point, I shut down because I wasn't about to get into an "anything you can do I can do better" war of words with her. But the consultant was on to me. She pointedly asked me why I'd gotten so quiet because even though we'd only known each other for two days, it seemed odd that I had nothing to say. I'm just listening I said. One of the local peeps even said I was scaring her by being so quiet and still, the consultant probed. They all sat and looked at me expectantly and I refused to bite. Just listening I repeated. Because if I opened my yap I'd lose my job.

By the time it was over and everything discussed to death, I had less than an hour to decompress and get ready for the reception at the Napoleon House. A quick recap: at last year's reception, I noticed one of the attendees noodling about on the old upright in the corner. Being on my third Pimm's Cup, I wandered over and started singing Girl from Ipanema in his ear, so I thought. Applause. More tunes. And we swore that if were both there the next year, we'd work up a tune list in advance. So we did, of about 15-20 songs. Here's the list:

Aint Misbehavin�

All of Me

All The Things You Are

Autumn Leaves

Blues In The Night

Body And Soul

Can�t Help Lovin� That Man

Come Sunday

Come Rain Or Come Shine

Don�t Get Around Much Anymore

Easy Living

Embraceable You

Georgia On My Mind

Girl From Ipanema

God Bless The Child

Have You Met Miss Jones?

How High The Moon

I Got It Bad

It�s Only A Paper Moon

Lady Be Good

Lady �s A Tramp

My Favorite Things

My Funny Valentine

My One And Only Love

My Romance

Nice Work If You Can Get It

Night And Day

Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square (A)

Route 66

Satin Doll

Sophisticated Lady

Stella By Starlight

Summertime

Take The �A� Train

The Way You Look Tonight

Wave

When I Fall In Love

When Sunny Gets Blue

Word had gotten around that I would be singing again during the preceeding days. People seemed pleased to hear it. We ended up cycling in sets of about three songs and in between people who'd missed a previous set were like YAHHHHHHH DID I MISS IT??? -snicker- So I'd sing, shovel food in my mouth, grab a drink, sing, grab a drink, talk for a few minutes, sing. Wash, rinse, repeat. Things got all burlesque towards the end when a woman from Colorado requested I sing My Funny Valentine to a particular man. I made him come out of the crowd and proceeded to sing to him while explicity acting out the song all over him. It got a great response, so I kept going with it for the next few songs. There are pictures. As soon as I get 'em, I'll share. Heh.

Reception ended at 9 and the Okies spirited me away with them to the Caf� du Monde. They were shocked and appalled to hear that I'd never been. I loved these people. I couldn't have been adopted by a better crowd and must remember to smooch Doc B if I ever see him again in thanks for introducing me to them. Huddled at a small table out of doors with hot beniegts and a cup of hot chocolate, I was tres content.

Meandered happily back to the hotel to pack and crash, as it was after midnight and my cab would be at the door at 7:30 AM to whisk me and my co-worker back to the airport in time for our 9 AM flight. I wanted to stay up all night. A couple of the Okies had to make a stop on Bourbn Street to make a specific purchase at one of the many gift shops, so I tagged along. What a mistake. Miss A was entranced by a karaoke bar and would. not. let. me. leave. Until I sang.

I'll show you my tits if you don't do it!!!

-arched brow- Fine. Go right ahead.

-sigh- Didn't work. Tried to explain that the draw of karaoke bars is to watch people make fools of themselves as they suck wind and that the crowd doesn't really want to hear someone not sucking. That didn't work either, so I gave in just so I could get out of there and get at least a couple hours of sleep that night/morning. Only thing that was even close to acceptable on the menu was Madonna's Like A Prayer. Went pretty well, actually. heh.

Strolled back to the hotel arm in arm. Hugs all the way 'round with promises to keep in touch. Went upstairs and called Man Unit to report on the evening and so I wouldn't feel so terribly alone in the giant soft queen-sized bed.