Looking back - Weekend at Schweitzer, ID

As my travels are about to come to an end, I've been thinking a lot about the experiences I've had and the places I've been.  One of best parts about traveling for work is that I can bring my husband along for fun weekends on occassion. 

In January of 2011, he came out to Washington with me for the weekend before my trip to Whitman County.  We drive north into Idaho and spent an amazing weekend at Schweitzer.  It's a big moutain wtih a beautiful resort.  It takes a good 20+ minutes to drive up the mountain from town, the road curving back and forth through the pretty pine trees. 

The weekend we were there, Schweitzer offered free cross country skiing lessons and rentals, so we took advantage of that on Saturday morning.  It was absolutely gorgeous!  The snow was perfect and the trail was challenging (for a newbie like me) but still lots of fun.

On Saturday evening, we went tubing...which was all sorts of fun.  Flying down the hill in a big blow up sled really brings back the kid in you!  Mike and I both loved it.

Sunday, we spent on the Mountain.  The view from the top was beautiful.  The mountain overlooks Sandpoint, ID and Lake Pend Orielle.  And the snow was PERFECT.  Schweitzer has some big, wide open, steep bowls that they actually groom.  I loved these runs.  You could fly down without any worry of icey spots or tree stumps.  And if you fell, you'd land in a pile of snow.  The conditions were perfect.  A bit windy and cold at the top of the mountain....but just perfect once you got moving.  Both Mike and I would love to go back.

We stayed at the Holiday Inn in Sandpoint...just at the base of the mountain.  It's a nice, newer Holiday Inn and we got an upgrade to a 1 room suite.  Our favorite place to enjoy a cold one after being on the mountain all day was Pucci's Pub.  We also loved their steaming hot baked potato topped with...hell, I don't even remember.  Chili, I think.  It was awesome.

Travels are about to come to an end...

As most of our family and friends know, Mike and I are expecting our first baby in October!  Because of this, the time has come that I transition to a new role within my company that will have me home, rather than traveling 5 days per week, every week.  I have one trip left next week to Janesville, WI. And then, I can put away the suitcase rack that's been sitting in our master bedroom for the past few years. 

My new role is with our Business Development team.  I've already begun the transition.  I have an actual desk now...a home!  It's much nicer than having to fight for a hotel cube on those rare occassions I was in the office.  Our team plays a role that is right between Marketing and Sales.  We follow up with folks that show interest in our products and try to get them appointments to speak with our sales team.  We also conduct customer satisfication surveys and attend trade shows.  I am very excited about this opportunity and I'm really looking forward to spending more time at home and with my family and friends.

And...if you didn't know already, it's a boy!

Update for 2012!

Wow...I sure did a poor job of keeping up with this blog!  A lot has happened since I last wrote in December.  I've been on a ton of work trips (19 already in 2012).  I've had some fun experiences.

I had two wonderful trips to Grand Junction, Colorado!  The first trip, I flew into Denver a day early so that I could spend the evening with my Aunt Stacie and Uncle Craig.  I drove the 3+ hours through the mountains to Grand Junction on Monday morning....what a beautiful drive!  Then, I flew my husband out on Friday afternoon, just as Denver got hit with a massive blizzard.  Of course, Denver got 24+ inches of fresh powder, but the mountains were dry.  Either way, we spent our Saturday at Vail together and then Sunday at Copper Mountian with my cousin Amber and her husband.  We also were able to celebrate my Uncle Craigs birthday with a big family dinner on Saturday evening and a trip to the casino to watch the Super Bowl on Sunday.  All in all, a fabolous weekend with lots of great memories. 

I spent another week in Minocqua, WI.  That is a quiet town in the winter and a hopping boat town in the summer.  A string quartet, Carpe Diem from Montana, was in town playing at the local theatre, so I enjoyed their show with a few glasses of wine.  I even bought their CD!

I had two trips to St. Louis and during one, I got myself a cheap seat at the Cardinals game.  What a nice stadium they have there!  And it was a beautiful, cool, breezy night.  It was perfect for a ball game.  Being a Tigers fan, it tried not to cheer for the Cardinals.  But when their pitcher hit a triple, I had to stand up and clap.  It was pretty fun watching an NL game LIVE. I've only really watched the Tigers play a few inter-league games on TV, so I never really understood the strategy that is invoved when your pitcher is hitting.  Another thing that was neat about St. Louis is that the Cardinals score their games different than any other MLB team.  I bought a scorecard and it had it's own instructions on how to score the game, the Cardinals way.  Pretty cool and actually really simple.  I had a great time.

I had my final trip to Whitman County, WA.  They have become one of my favorite customers.  While it was an uneventful week (which is a good thing when talking about work), I was able to visit my favorite Pullman restaurants one last time. 

Janesville, WI has been a customer of mine for the past 8 months.  They are just about to go LIVE.  Last week while there, I again got the itch to catch a ball game so I bought a cheap seat from stub hub and drove the 1.5 hours to Milwaukee on Wednesday evening.  Like usual, I didn't have much cash on me so I was planning to park on the street somewhere near the stadium.  As I found out, there is NO WHERE to park near Miller Field.  Luckily though, I spotted a shuttle bus that offered free shuttle service to the games.  I followed that back to the bar, parked and hopped on.  While on our way to the stadium, an older gentleman began talking to me.  He, his daughter and son-in-law had an extra seat...10 rows behind home plate!  They invited me to ditch my nose-bleed ticket and to sit with them for the game.  NICE!!  The Brewers won.  I used my last few bucks of cash to tip the shuttle bus driver, so no scorecard this time. But, I enjoyed the game and loved seeing those funny sausages running around the field.

All in all, it's been a great first half of 2012. 

Bayside, TX - December 12th

Bayside is about 45 minutes southeast of Houston. While I've spent a great amount of time in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area and also in Austin, I've never been to Houston. This was going to be a one-and-done trip...I was only going to help our customers through their initial data conversion review. So, I was hoping to maximize my time while in the Houston area. I was really looking forward to learning some Texas two-step!

Bayside, while it sounds nice, is a pretty gloomy town. Lots of traffic, fast foot restaurants, trash on the road, etc. It just wasn't a very nice area. And it rained almost the entire week.

My customers suggested that I visit a the Boardwalk in Kemeh, TX. They said there would be lots of shops, restaurants and activities right on the gulf. So, I made the trip out after work on Tuesday. The Boardwalk was neat...and there were lots of shops and restaurants. But, with it being the middle of the week and winter, most everything was closed. It was a gloomy night...very foggy and misting. After a short walk by the water, I had gumbo and salad at Landry's Seafood and then made my way back to the hotel.



We were able to wrap up our work faster than expected and I was able to go home on Thursday. So, it was an uneventful week. But I was happy to get home a day early to spend a long weekend with my husband.

Owensboro, KY

I'd been looking forward to this trip, thinking I'd finally get to spend some time in Louisville! Maybe I'd have a chance to check out Churchill Downs or I could take a tour of a Bourbon Distillery. Or, I could check out the Louisville Slugger factory.

My customer was listed on the schedule as "Audubon". A quick google search shows that Audubon is right near the airport. Ah...but to my surprise, my customer is actually "Audubon Area Community Services", located 1.5 hours west of Louisville in a little town called Owensboro. Bummer. It was going to be a little more difficult to find adventure on this trip than I expected.

If you haven't noticed, I LOVE my BBQ. Not much can compare to the Hard Eight BBQ in Coppell, TX. And I am a huge fan of Slows BBQ in Detroit. So, when my customer told me that Owensboro is the "self-described BBQ capital of the world", I was impressed! But, I would have to see for myself.



Owensboro has two competing BBQ joints in town. I visited the Old Hickory BBQ first. While the meat was good (sliced pork), I didn't care for the BBQ sauce and the sides were very boring. I wasn't too impressed.

Next was Moonlight. They serve their food buffett-style. They had pork, beef and lamb, along with all of the sides and desserts you could want. It was GOOD! Their BBQ sauce was nice and their house hot-sauce was good enough for me to buy some to take home.

But, neither comes close to the Hard Eight. Or Slows. Hell, even Famous Daves. I don't know who decided to name them the BBQ capital of the world. Maybe the BBQ capital of Kentucky. But that seems like it would be a stretch even.

Owensboro sits on the Ohio river and is just 30 minutes from Evansville, Indiana. By random chance I found out that one of my favories, Bob Seger, would be playing at the brand-new Evansville Event Center on Wednesday night. I found a ticket on stub hub and made my way to Evansville right after work. The concert was GREAT! And I got to be there for the first-ever concert at the new event center. It was very cool.

On my way back to the airport on Friday, I hit a detour in New Albany...just across the river from Louisville. The bridge was closed and I had to drive through town to get to the next one. I was hungry and I had some extra time to kill, so I drove down a few blocks to find somewhere to stop. And right on a corner was the River City Winery! Perfect! I had a few samples of their wine and their lasagna lunch special. Both were amazing, and I left with a bottle of their Riesling and Cabernet.

I have just one more trip scheduled for "Audubon". Both bottles of wine have since been emptied, so I am looking forward to getting back there to purchase a few more.

Ft. Worth and Dallas, Texas

I've spent quite a bit of time in the Ft. Worth/Dallas area over the past year getting our long-time customer Coppell, TX up and running on the .Net version of our software. And to my surprise, just a few weeks after our "go-live", I found myself back again to upgrade them to the latest release... what we call our "Next Gen" version of our software. While I was looking forward to a (well needed) week in the office and I was excited to spend some quality time with my new Husband....I can't complain too much. I love visiting Texas, the food is great and my customers are some of the nicest people I know. And...I needed the airline miles to hit Platinum status for the 2012 year.

I just happened to find myself back as the Texas Rangers were battling the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series. While they were playing game 6 and 7 in St. Louis, I was still able to enjoy the excitement and buzz you only feel when "your" team is on the verge of a world championship. Everyone was excited. My customers even grew out their playoff beards in support of the team. I, for the week, became a Texas Rangers fan.

On Thursday night, I went to Ft. Worth to visit the world's largest Honky Tonk...Billy Bobs! It is truly an amazing place. There is a full sized Bull Riding ring inside of the bar. They offer free line-dancing lessons every night (I got there too late for this, however). And they bring in musical acts several times a week.

While I went to watch the Rangers game, I was pleased to find out that Rodney Atkins was performing LIVE as well. And...there was no cover! Talk about a great deal! So, I had some BBQ and found myself a spot next to the bar by one of the many TV's yet still in sight of the stage to see the concert. There were two performers before Rodney came out, and both were good. Rodney Atkins played about 6 songs to an audience of now more than 1000 people...and mostly acoustic.



Anyways...the concert was great and I was sad to see it end. But, it wrapped up just in time for the final innings of what turned out to be a VERY entertaining ball game. So many times, the place was ready to erupt in celebration. Unfortunately, the Rangers blew their chances. I stuck around a little while longer to watch the line-dancing and two-stepping (they sure know how to dance down in Texas!).



Friday, before I left for the airport, I was able to squeeze in a trip to my favorite BBQ Pit in the world...the Hard Eight BBQ. I had a chopped brisket sandwich and bought a bottle of hot-sauce for Mike before making my way to DFW for my trip home.

Geagua County, OH

It's easy for us Michiganders to dismiss our friendly (or at times...not so friendly) neighbors to the southeast, as we've all been bred to loathe Ohio. And there are many reasons for this:

• The Toledo War of 1835 - we clearly came out the winners on this one


• Stupid low speed limits


• Ridiculously tough enforcement of low speed limits


• Long, flat, boring 5 hour drive from Toledo until you finally reach Kentucky


• LeBron James


• Ohio State Football


• Ohio State Football fans


• etc....

Ohio generally sucks. At least, that's what I was thinking as I packed up my wagon for the 4+ hour drive along the southern coast of Lake Erie to Geauga County for work this week.

But to my surprise, it really wasn't all that bad. My customers recommended the town of Willoughby and the Willoughby Brewing Company for dinner. It is beautiful building tucked behind the shops on main street in this cute little town reminiscent of Holly or Milford. It was much bigger inside than you would think, with a dining area to the left and the bar on the right. Suspended high above the restaurant was a Lionel train track and a working, moving train. The crowd seemed to be mostly professionals coming right from the office . Dinner was fine...I had the "Bibb" Salad and a cup of chili (chili needed some more kick to it). The beer was tasty...the Moonshadow IPA was my favorite and the Pumpkinhead Pumpkin Ale was nice. Overall, a cool place to go for dinner and a few drinks after a long day at work.

But best part of the night was my run-in with a very cool chick. Tiffany sat down next to me when I was finishing up my meal and we began to chat. She's from Willoughby, but ironically went to college at Oakland University...just a stones throw from our new home in Auburn Hills. She's just starting a new job, she's planning her wedding, was in a band for a while and is just generally a fun girl to talk to. We hit if off, exchanged contact information, a made tentative plans to meet up the next evening.

Last time I was in this area (almost 3 years ago), I'd visited the Chalet Debonnee Vineyards. One of Ohio's largest wineries, I really enjoyed my visit and was interested in checking out more of the local wineries this time. I picked the Candlelight Winery in Garrettsville to visit on Wednesday after work. It was about half an hour drive through gorgeous farmland and rolling hills. The fall colors here are absolutely amazing too. And they have a very large Amish population...I must have passed a dozen buggies on my way.

The winery is cute. It has a good sized tasting room with a fireplace and a nice outdoor area lit up with white Christmas lights. One of the wines has a picture of the owners adorable little pug on the label. The young man working behind the counter was dressed nicely in a sweater and tie. I started my visit with a tasting of their wines, then settled in with a glass of their Cabernet Franc and a BBQ Chicken flat bread. I enjoyed a glass of their Riesling next, while reading the newspaper by the fireplace. It was a really nice, quiet and relaxing evening. I purchased both a bottle of the Cabernet and the Riesling before leaving.

I made my way back to Willoughby next with hopes of catching the Comedian at the Brewery. But, by time I got there, the show had already started and the seats were all full. Luckily though, Mullarkey's across the street was advertising Karaoke on Wednesday nights. And just as I was making my way in, my new friend Tiffany sent a message and said she would see me there. The pub filled up quick and we spent the rest of the evening singing and listening to classic 80's rock and country.

Thursday, I'd booked a spot through the local Parks & Rec department to take part in a cooking class. Today, we learned all about Won Tons. You can do a lot more with Won Tons than you would think! We used everything from pumpkin, chocolate, chicken salad to fruit fillings. You can deep-fry the little buggers, bake or poach them. I've learned a lot and I'm excited to get home to cook some up for my husband.

All in all, I had a really fun week in Ohio. I made a new friend, had some great beer and wine, and enjoyed the cooking class. I can easily say that I would welcome the opportunity to come back.