Last week, I went on a business trip to St. Louis. It was great. I instagrammed the whole trip (it kept me sane) with my ipod (still have a dumb phone), and you can follow me on instagram if you want or whatever; my username is @annie88b. Since I only have about 29 followers, I needed to find another place to share all of these pictures and wise insights, so you’re in for a treat. Someone needs to enjoy my witty hashtags. #ifeelobligatedtoinsertonenow
Flying in a plane makes me all giddy, but I was accompanying one of our authors, so I had to keep it professional (difficult).
Despite my earlier worry that I would be trapped inside the whole trip, I did manage to make it outside once and a while. Little did I know that it would be the last place I would want to be. This Michigan girl cannot handle the heat and humidity of St. Louis. I did see this one landmark from afar, though.
There was a crazy storm Sunday night that rolled in super quickly. I managed to snap this pic of the angry clouds before it downpoured. Also, random, but this is a picture of the carpet in our hotel. HOTELS HAVE THE CRAZIEST CARPET. Is there like a special, different carpet store for hotels? Because I can’t envision walking into my local Carpet Bonanza and finding this (and obviously I would want to).
I was there for a Christian trade show and yes, there were multiple celebrity sightings. Again, I had to keep it together because I was traveling for work, but believe me, on the inside I was screaming. Duh. I even managed to squeak out an entire sentence to the author of my favorite horse book from back when I was an equine-obsessed kid.
Christian trade shows are weird places. Where else can you find jelly beans for evangelistic purposes? Each color of jelly bean had words on them like “Jesus,” “salvation,” or my favorite, the black jelly bean, which simply read “sin.” I wasn’t clear on if you were supposed to eat the black ones or not. Thoughts?
There was also a Duck Dynasty booth where they handed out free cardboard beards for those of us who are not as blessed in the facial-hair department. It was a definite highlight seeing a whole bunch of publishing professionals wearing cardboard beards, as you can imagine. Next year, I’m definitely going to bring something awesome to hand out to promote our authors. I’m open to suggestions, so start thinking now.
During the flight home we traveled through a storm. IT WAS INCREDIBLE. I understand that I really should have a healthy fear of things like this, but at the same time, there’s not much I can do about it, so I chose to enjoy it. Immensely.
All in all, I kept it together. I made sure we caught all of our connecting flights. I made a reservation at a restaurant. I even wore wedges one day, much to the chagrin of my calves!
Professionalism becomes me, on occasion. I think.
The last time I had to be professional on a business trip? Read about it here.
Planting Sequoias 