we don't know where we're going

I arrived in DC today to teach the make up class for the laptop debacle class. I am hoping the events of today are not a harbinger of things to come.

I flew in and did some errands while waiting for my work pal S to arrive. He's not a consultant (he's, eek, in sales) but he agreed to help me out with the class in case there's more problems with the laptops (he's a geek by training but because of moral failings went to the dark side). We got to the office where the class is being held at 4:15. I was told I would have access to the classroom at 4 pm so I could set up. Ha.

We walked into the building and I was trying to look up the floor for the company. S said "it's 4" so we went to the fourth floor. Wrong floor. I found the address and we were supposed to be on the 3rd floor so we took the elevator there. There was a sign on the office door saying we had to check in with reception on the 7th floor. We went there. There was a sign on the office door on the 7th floor telling us to go to the 3rd floor because the 7th floor office had been closed.

We went back to the 3rd floor but the doors were locked and there was no intercom or anything. So I tried to call my contact. She answered and I managed to tell her we were waiting outside the office for her and then my cell coverage went to SOS. S tried to call her on his phone but his coverage was non-existent too. We got someone to let us into the office even though there was a sign on the door saying "NO UNBADGED VISITORS BEYOND THIS POINT" because my contact didn't bother to come out and get us. Ha. We don't need no stinkin badges.

The class room is a disaster (the people using it didn't leave until 430, leaving us only an hour for set up and testing - thanks asspipes!). Three odd shaped tables. One has a piece of metal sticking out of the corner. I just know someone is going to get impaled on it. Some of the power plugs don't work so we had to crawl around under tables to find ones that did work. Our contact is worried she won't have enough badges for the students. The room has, seriously, like 20 extra chairs meaning there's barely any room to move around (a whole herd of the chairs is in front of my white board - I need to use the white board - how I will reach it if they don't move the chairs, I don't know). Ech.

Then S's gps sent us on a wild goose chase through Alexandria trying to find our hotel. We got there, and it turns out the woman S contacted to make our reservation made it for 21 December instead of 21 September. The hotel was sold out of rooms. I could feel the steam starting to come out my ears. After traveling all day and driving in traffic from Dulles and then having to set up the crap class room and spending 45 minutes looking for the fucking hotel the last thing I wanted to be was homeless.

S said "when you get upset you stop looking at people" because I was staring at my blackberry thinking "why can't I just be an application that can live anywhere?" and wondering if S was serious about getting a hotel in Reston and trying to do that shit ass commute back to Alexandria tomorrow morning. In the rain (it's supposed to rain, it's raining on and off now). All the hotels in Alexandria are sold out.

I decided the best course of action was to go outside and smoke. Came back in the lobby after, problem solved. S thinks the guy gave us rooms (he had to over ride the computer system) because of me. I think he meant because front desk guy was afraid I would kill him if he tried to send us to another hotel. Or maybe he meant because I looked so cute in my "I'm not homeless, I just dress like I am" outfit with my blond afro threatening to engulf the lobby.

Yeah, I suffer. But at least this time I'm making someone in sales suffer with me. And, sales people always pick up the tab for dinner, which S did tonight.

You have to be glad for the little happy things in life and ignore all the other shit. Or so people who don't travel as much as I do keep telling me...