so, several months ago, my bosses asked me if i would be interested in going to denver for the national council for exceptional children (CEC) conference this month, if they could get it approved. of course, i said yes - free trip off the rock & i get to learn stuff!?! score! well, sure enough, i got ok'd and yesterday flew (for what seemed like forever) to denver. it was pretty uneventful, a little bit of turbulence but smooth sailing by my SEAK standards, and the only hang-up is that i realized a) how much i hate the travel part of traveling (teleportations, PLEASE!!) and b) how much i dislike traveling w/ people i don't really know. i am one of 12 SpEd staff on the trip, the only para and student, and the youngest by several (atleast 10) years. i know my two bosses, have some connections w/ others (know their kids, went to elementary school when they were teaching, they work w/ mom, etc), but it's still deja vu from my not-so-favorite swim meet days in college. there are 4 of us crammed into a small, 2-full bed hotel room, one of which snores it turns out, and so i didn't sleep even though i hadn't slept the night before after packing & finishing up my class that ended yesterday. it's been a crazy week.
we did have a good dinner last night, adventuring out to steuben's - a restaurant featured on guy fieri's "diners, drive-ins, and dives." it was DELISH. i'm now in love with crispy brussel sprouts, which i can't even begin to describe. yum. we all stayed up late last night going over the conference schedule for today, choosing which sessions to attend, and me going to bed too late - hanging off the edge of the bed the whole night due to lack of space.
i went to 6 lectures today, 8 am to 5 pm, almost straight through. it reminded me sooo much of senior projects day in college, but more eloquent. my fav by far was the first one i went to on adapted PE - a subject near & dear to my interests. turns out, there's such a thing as adapted aquatics instruction - right up my alley! and an excuse to continue coaching after i graduate and start working in the REAL workforce. the rest were ok, hard to relate to some b/c i'm still a student and don't have my own class or experience, but hopefully will be helpful in the future. my brain hurts though. i'm not used to being in "school" all day long again!
tomorrow will likely be the same, but i need to find some time to explore the expo hall & all the goodies they have. and hopefully some shopping time - our hotel RIGHT ACROSS THE STREET from a mall, and there's an H&M logo on the outside - hello, old friend! thank goodness my suitcase expands and i still have 30 lbs i can load in...
denver itself isn't anything too exciting from what i've briefly witnessed; we landed at the airport in the middle of farm fields and were greeted by tornado shelter bathrooms before walking out to wait for the hotel shuttle and experiencing a tornado warning. i swear we ended up in kansas by accident. i still don't see any real mountains; the ones beyond the convention center look more like big hills. so much for the rockies. nobody follows the pedestrian crossing signals. people can ride bikes here b/c the rods are flat. and yesterday the humidity was horrible. not so bad today, but not impressive enough to move here like the idea i had been toying with before coming since the weather has been so awful back home.
so is this trip worth giving up being home and missing the only home swim meet of the season? time will tell. i sure do miss my kids though...they aren't so awkward to talk to. i hate fake interest & chit-chat. i like doing things on my own instead of having to wait for others or make group decisions. and i don't like holding back to appear professional, even though i have nothing interesting to hold back or contribute. but, i'm off the rock for 5 days!
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