The beginning of my vacation all blurs together in my mind. There was a pre-vacation energy running through my veins, and wrapping up work, the house, and packing all seemed to happen in a blink. We left Thursday night and went to Chicago, crashed at Tedd’s, and somehow survived through Friday until 2pm when the limo came to pick us up. Nothing like feeling like a high roller going to Vegas than being picked up in a limo. Or drinking a bottle of champagne in a limo. While calling all the people you know gloating you’re on vacation and they’re working. Or drinking the second bottle of champagne (that one was mostly me, and it was mostly warm.)

So, cue O’Hare, mostly drunk. It’s going to be a good vacation. We flew American down to Dallas, and I gotta say, I’m mostly impressed with American Airlines. Their commercials about improved leg room is right on – the seats were comfty. What irked me, in my sobering stage, was that I was starting to get the munchies, and I could see the suckers in first class eating and I could smell their dinner. The steward only gave me a small bag of pretzels and a 6 oz glass of ginger ale. Not even the full can they were pouring. That pissed me off.

In DFW, we stopped off at a bar to keep the buzz flowing and got large steins of Shinerbock. Mmmmm shiner. About halfway into his, Stuck started getting giggly, so I knew I wasn’t the only one enjoying myself. The flight out of Dallas brought us around a big thunderstorm. Tedd was sitting by the window, and snapped some photos (see the picture gallery,) of the storm from the plane.

Around 9:30/10pm PDT we landed in Burbank, CA and met with Vanessa and her Mom and Stepdad. (Ness had already been out there a week before we arrived.) They drove us back to their house in Ventura, giving us the audio tour of the area and geography on the way. We had snacks and beers when we got home, and basically just crashed. A day of travel does that to you. Early that next morning, we had breakfast and got on the road to the six hour desert drive to Las Vegas.

How’s that for a teaser?

Hello, attentive blogsters! Sorry for the drought, but I’ve been on vacation. This is my first day back at work after taking all of last week off for a whirlwind trip to Las Vegas and California/LA area.

I’ve been taking notes, and will have several blog entries about the trip. In the meantime, there are photos up in the picture gallery you might enjoy. Marc has more shots from others in the group on his site.

In most recent news, I’m back at work four hours, and I already wish I was back on vacation. At least today has been slow, so far, and I’ve finally been able to pickup my office.

Back to the grind, Vegas stories to come…