It's Not A Bender, It's A Lifestyle.

It's all over but the shouting...crying, puking, laughing, passing out, anything else that will happen over the next week. The work week is over, the email OOO is on, the Signal and Slack notifications are off. The laundry is done, the money's out of the bank, yadda yadda. It's just a matter of about 36 hours until I'm on a chartered plane to the promised land. It's a nice change to have a day off before the trip. I can relax and get all the final prep done at leisure, then can get a full night's good sleep and be ready to hit the ground running Saturday morning. Haven't even started to pack but have the luxury of all day tomorrow to do that. Tonight it's a fairly traditional Friday night on a Thursday, can finish up the playlist while drinking wine and staying up late to make sure tomorrow night I get good zzz's. The money is good. Full $6K out and ready to blow. At $3100 currently on the CC which isn't ideal, but if I can stay under $4K-ish aft...

It's on like Donkey Kong. One week til the Vegas. Here's the plan, limited as it is. Saturday: Xmas Eve. If all goes well with the JSX flight, I'll be on the ground by about 10:30 and over to the Grand by 11a. Check in will be handled by the app, but may look at the line to see if I should wait to check on what kind of upgrade I can get. In any case should be able to head up, dump the bag and get on down to the strip by latest 12p. Probably will post up somewhere by about 1p where I can get some victuals and drinkuals and watch the Niners game, at least for a while. Sat night, no plans, probably will try to make it down to V/P to check on what's left of the old Sam Ross trio crew. Then maybe a late dinner and we'll see how we're feeling, it will have been an early wake up to catch JSX at OAK, so turning in earlyish would not be a punishment. Sunday: Xmas day. Up whenever. Wandering probably when out of the room, may check out the new Brew Dog place by MGM, or us...

It's happening. Arizona, that is. I have, for better or worse, acquired the new position and have to be moved to the desert by March 1. I've already gone into the pluses and minuses so I won't do that again here. Suffice to say my life will change pretty significantly this year. Can only hope it's for the better, and will leave it at that. More to say as the move progresses. But hey - Vegas in 10 days, right? Not even going to start dicking with the AZ move stuff until I'm back. This would normally be the time I'd be pushing everything into the back burner and obsessing about impending Vegas but it's been such a rush to get this job over the past month that I have really not had much time to lock in on the trip.  Luckily, this trip's been on easy mode for months now. Nothing's changed. Money's fine, room's great, not much of a plan outside of a couple food reservations. Have one more site visit in AZ to get past early next week then it's...

20 Days to Vegas. So much shit going on in life right now it's hard to focus on the trip. This week is crucial to my assent to greatness in my company. Trying to get kept on by working through an extended audition with potential new bosses by traveling to LA for a vendor site visit (complete, and went fine I think) then 2 days of them here, and 2 days in Phoenix,  the potential landing place for me in all this. I'm 90% in the door and will be the guy for this move.  I'm conflicted about that. I've been in the Bay Area since high school, and in The City proper for 15 years. I've carved out a comfortable, boring niche here but it's all getting a bit stale. I live in a fetid closet, and while the rent is low I despise my landlords/roommates and would love to bail on them. I also, as a white, bald, old chubby guy, have zero chance of ever knowing the touch of a female again here. It's just not that kinda town anymore. So while I'm set up well here, I wouldn...